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Dessert

White Cake

A light, airy cake made with powdered sugar, butter, egg whites, cornstarch, milk, flour, and flavored with almond or rose extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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White Cake

Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

White Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Cream the butter and powdered sugar together until light and fluffy.

  3. Dissolve the cornstarch in half of the milk.

  4. Mix the cornstarch mixture with the butter and sugar.

  5. Add the remaining milk with the baking soda dissolved in it.

  6. Sift the cream of tartar with the flour.

  7. Gradually add the sifted mixture to the batter.

  8. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  9. Flavor with almond or rose extract.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake for 40 minutes.

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. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Beaten whites trap air, giving the cake its light, airy structure when folded in.
Butter
Creaming with sugar traps air and adds richness and a tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps create a fine, tender texture when creamed with butter.
Cornstarch
Softens the crumb, giving a finer, more delicate texture than flour alone.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the beaten egg whites. Folding gently keeps the air bubbles in the whipped whites intact. Stirring or beating them in would deflate the batter and produce a dense, heavy cake.

“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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