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Dessert

Scots Seed Cake

A buttery cake with sugar, almonds, candied orange peel, citron, nutmeg, caraway seeds, eggs, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,115 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Scots Seed Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

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

  2. In a bowl, cream the butter until smooth.

Make the batter

  1. Gradually add the sugar and then the egg yolks, mixing well.

  2. Incorporate the flour a little at a time.

  3. Fold in the sweetmeats, almonds, nutmeg, caraway seeds, and egg whites.

  4. Stir in the brandy.

Bake

  1. Butter a cake pan and pour in the batter, smoothing the top.

  2. Sprinkle caraway comfits on top.

  3. Bake without moving until nearly done, to prevent the sweetmeats from sinking.

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. Almond + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 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. Nutmeg + carawaytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together200 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Flour + carawaytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks enrich the batter and whites, folded in, lighten its crumb.
All-purpose flour
Flour provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Butter
Creaming butter traps air and adds richness and a tender texture.
Loaf sugar
Sugar sweetens the cake and helps it brown and stay moist.
Candied orange peel
Candied peel adds concentrated citrus sweetness and aroma throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Bake without moving until nearly done. Disturbing the batter before it sets lets the heavy sweetmeats sink to the bottom. Keeping the pan still while the structure firms prevents this.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, rose, sugar, almond, nutmeg, caraway):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, rose, sugar, almond, nutmeg, caraway. 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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