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Dessert

Marble Cake

A layered cake made with alternating batter of white and brown sugar, molasses, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Marble Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°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.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the sour milk and egg whites, mixing well.

  4. In another bowl, combine the cream of tartar, baking soda, and flour; gradually add to the wet mixture.

Make the batters and bake

  1. In a separate bowl, mix the brown sugar, molasses, butter, sour milk, nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, pepper, and egg yolks.

  2. Combine the two mixtures by alternating spoonfuls into a greased cake pan.

  3. Swirl the batters together gently with a knife.

  4. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

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.

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

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

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

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

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air, giving a light, tender crumb and rich flavor.
Egg whites
Add moisture and structure, helping the batter hold air and rise.
Egg yolks
Add richness and fat to the darker batter, tenderizing its crumb.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and cream of tartar to produce gas that lifts the cake.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness to the darker batter.

The step that matters

Swirl the batters gently. Overmixing the swirl blends the two batters into an even brown color, erasing the marbling. A few gentle passes with a knife keep distinct light and dark streaks while the batters stay separate.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, egg, cream, flour, molasses):

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Allspicefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, egg, cream, flour, molasses. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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