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Dessert

Molasses Cake

A sweet cake made with molasses, baking soda, sour milk, eggs, butter or lard, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Molasses Cake

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Molasses Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the batter

  1. Mix molasses, baking soda, and sour milk in a bowl.

  2. Add eggs and butter (or lard/pork gravy) and beat for 1-2 minutes.

  3. Stir in flour until the mixture has a soft cake consistency.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until done, being careful not to over-bake.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Molasses + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Provides the dark color, deep sweetness, and rich flavor of the cake.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tenderness.
Eggs
Add structure and help bind the batter as it sets in the oven.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as it sets, and is added until the batter reaches a soft consistency.

The step that matters

Avoid over-baking. Over-baking dries out the crumb and drives off moisture, so the cake turns dense and dry. Bake only until a tester comes out clean and the top springs back.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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