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Dessert

A Large Rich Two-guinea Cake

A rich cake made with butter, eggs, sugar, spices, brandy, citrus peel, almonds, flour, currants, and bitter almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

A Large Rich Two-guinea Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a large bowl, rub the softened butter until fine.

  3. In another bowl, whisk the eggs for 10 minutes.

  4. Over a gentle heat, combine the whisked eggs and powdered sugar until warm, then remove from heat and whisk until cool.

  5. Mix the egg and sugar mixture with the butter using your hands.

  6. Add the ground mace, ground cinnamon, and brandy to the mixture.

  7. Fold in the chopped lemon and orange peel, citron, and sweet almonds.

  8. Gradually add half of the sifted flour, then fold in the currants.

  9. In a separate bowl, mix the pounded bitter almonds with a little powdered sugar to prevent oiling, then add to the mixture.

  10. Finally, fold in the remaining flour until well combined.

Bake

  1. Line a large cake pan with parchment paper, placing four sheets inside and at the bottom.

  2. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake in the preheated oven.

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 + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Cinnamon + orangetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Mace + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Unsalted butter
Creams with sugar to trap air and give the cake a rich, tender crumb.
Eggs
Provide structure and moisture as they set during baking.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps create a fine, even texture when creamed.
All-purpose flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Currants
Add chewy sweetness and fruity bites throughout the cake.
Mixed lemon and orange peel
Adds aromatic citrus flavor and a bright, slightly bitter note.

The step that matters

Whisking the eggs and sugar over gentle heat. Warming the eggs and sugar gently helps the sugar dissolve and the batter emulsify smoothly. Overheating can scramble the eggs, leaving lumps and an uneven texture in the finished cake.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, sugar, cinnamon, brandy, lemon, orange. 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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