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Dessert

Brown Layer Cake

A moist layered cake made with molasses, brown sugar, butter, flour, eggs, and baking soda, topped with boiled egg white frosting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Molasses and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Brown Layer 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 the batter

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix molasses, brown sugar, butter, and warm water until smooth.

  3. Add flour, egg yolks, and baking soda; mix until well combined.

  4. In a separate bowl, beat the egg white until stiff peaks form, then fold it into the batter.

Bake and finish

  1. Pour batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 25–30 minutes.

  2. For the frosting, use the remaining egg white to make boiled frosting and spread it between the layers.

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. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + eggtop 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

Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cake's crumb together as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep flavor, and dark color to the cake.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps keep the crumb soft.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and carries flavor.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the batter into a smooth, cohesive mix.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidity of molasses to produce gas that makes the cake rise.

The step that matters

Folding in the stiff egg white. Stiff egg white holds air bubbles that give the cake lift. Folding gently, rather than stirring, keeps those bubbles from collapsing and leaving a dense 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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