yeast cake
- noun
- /jiːst keɪk/
- Archaic
- After mixing the ingredients, let the dough sit for an hour until the yeast cake activates and it doubles in size.
Examples
-
I recognize Mama's dress coming back from Pani Malinowska's with a baking sheet full of yeast cake.
Fiction book (2000) -
The recipe calls for one yeast cake to ensure the dough rises beautifully in the oven.
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Rum baba is derived from the recipe for the tall "babka" yeast cake that was introduced to the world by the Polish communities.
Blog text (7) -
Rum baba (also "baba au rhum" in French) is a small yeast cake saturated in rum and sometimes filled with whipped cream.
Blog text (7) -
To make the bread rise properly, dissolve the yeast cake in warm water before mixing it into the dough.
Synonyms
A very small living thing used in baking and brewing to make dough rise or ferment drinks
A substance that makes dough rise, like yeast
A soft block of living yeast used to make bread rise
A small living thing used in baking to make dough rise
How Alcoholic
Surface Forms
Morphology
The compound is directly compositional: 'yeast' names the substance and 'cake' can mean a compact mass or lump (as in 'a cake of soap'), so a B1 learner who knows both words can infer 'a small solid mass of compressed yeast' without prior exposure. This noun+noun construction and the 'cake' = compact mass sense are cross-linguistically common, supporting immediate comprehension.
Etymology
Yeast cake comes from old baking practice: bakers pressed active yeast into a small, soft cake so it was easy to store and use. When you dissolve a yeast cake in warm water it makes the dough rise, so the name points to the little block that 'makes bread rise'.