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Baking

Nut Cake

A baked cake with butter, sugar, sour milk, raisins, butter‑nut meats, flour, eggs, baking soda, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Nut Cake

Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Nut Cake

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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

  2. Add the sour milk, raisins, and butter‑nut meats, mixing well.

  3. In another bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  4. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined.

  5. Beat in the eggs one at a time until fully incorporated.

  6. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.

Bake

  1. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

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

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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 the cake bakes and sets.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake crumb as it sets in the oven.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add richness and tender texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, fluffy texture when creamed.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tenderness.

The step that matters

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined.. Mixing dry ingredients in gradually and stopping once combined keeps the batter from overdeveloping gluten, which would make the cake tough and dense.

“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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