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Dessert

Wedding Cake a LA Kennedy

A rich wedding cake made with eggs, butter, molasses, spices, fruit, and nuts, baked at 300°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,150 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Wedding Cake a LA Kennedy

Oven, in the book's wordsA very slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  3. Beat the eggs separately.

  4. Add the yolks to the butter and sugar mixture.

  5. Warm the molasses.

  6. Mix in the baking soda and spices.

  7. Combine the molasses mixture with the butter and sugar mixture.

  8. Gradually add the flour.

  9. Fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites.

  10. Stir in the brandy, rose water, and lemon juice.

Add the fruit and bake

  1. Dredge the fruit with extra flour.

  2. Fold it into the batter.

  3. Pour the batter into a cake pan.

  4. Bake for 4 hours, or divide into two pans and bake for 2 hours.

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. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Lemon + rosetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,174 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Brandy + clovetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,362 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites trapped by beating add lift, and yolks add richness and structure to the batter.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep, slightly bitter sweetness.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic lemon juice and molasses to release gas and help the cake rise.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the batter as it bakes.
Raisins
Add chewy sweetness and moisture to the finished cake.

The step that matters

Fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites. Overmixing deflates the whipped whites and loses the air that lifts the batter. Fold gently, just until no streaks remain.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, butter, molasses, lemon, brandy, rose):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter, molasses, lemon, brandy, rose. 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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