Skip to main content
Dessert

Mocha Cakes

Mocha cakes are sweet baked cakes with almond or peanut pieces and a powdered sugar icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Vanilla and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Mocha Cakes

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.

Make the batter

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

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together, beating continuously.

  3. Slowly add the milk, then sift in the flour and baking powder, mixing gently.

  4. Fold in the well-beaten egg whites.

  5. Pour the batter into a long pan or two square layer-cake tins.

  6. Bake until golden brown.

Ice and finish

  1. For the icing, beat together the powdered sugar, butter, and water, adding vanilla to taste.

  2. If the icing is too thick, add more water.

  3. Once the cake is cold, cut it into 1-inch square pieces.

  4. Ice five sides of each piece and dip them in finely chopped peanuts or blanched almonds.

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. Vanilla + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Butter
Creams with the sugar to give the cake a tender, fine-grained crumb.
Egg whites
Whipped into the batter to add lift and structure as the cake bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cake rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it sets.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown during baking.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Egg whites hold air only when whipped and gently folded in; stirring vigorously deflates them, which leads to a dense cake with less rise.

“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.

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesAlmond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipesAlmond CustardAlmond Custard22 recipesAlmond WafersAlmond Wafers22 recipes