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Dessert

Caramel Cake

A sweet cake made with sugar, butter, milk, flour, eggs, baking powder, and caramel icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Caramel Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake batter

  1. Beat the eggs, sugar, and butter until the butter is smooth.

  2. Add the milk, then add the flour.

  3. Mix well.

  4. Incorporate the baking powder into the flour, then add the flour mixture to the batter.

Make the caramel icing

  1. Combine the light brown sugar, cream, and water in a pan for the caramel icing.

  2. Stir and boil for exactly three minutes.

  3. Remove from heat and beat until slightly cool.

  4. Add the vanilla.

  5. Beat again until nearly cold.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the cake crumb.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cake as it sets.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises.
Light brown sugar
Sweetens the icing and adds caramel flavour through its molasses.

The step that matters

Boiling the caramel icing for exactly three minutes. Sugar syrup concentration depends on cooking time. Boiling too briefly leaves the icing thin, while boiling too long makes it hard and grainy as it cools.

“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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