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Dessert

Madison Cake

A fruit cake made with raisins, currants, citron, nutmeg, and butter, baked at 350°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin 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 ↓

Madison 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.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the butter and sugar until light and creamy, then add the cream.

  2. Slowly stir in the beaten eggs, followed by the flour in three additions.

  3. Mix until smooth, then add the grated nutmeg and gently fold in the fruit.

  4. Pour the batter into pans lined with buttered paper and smooth the top with a wet knife.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until done.

  2. Serve plain or iced.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Nutmeg + raisintop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten eggs add structure and lift, helping the heavy batter rise and set.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the cake brown and taste rounded.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, traps air for a lighter crumb.
Raisins
Add chewy sweetness and moisture through the cake.
Currants
Add tart, concentrated fruit flavour and moisture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Beating the butter and sugar until light and creamy. Creaming works air into the fat and sugar, and that air expands in the oven. Under-beating leaves a dense cake, while the eggs must be added slowly so the batter does not curdle or separate.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, cream, egg, flour, nutmeg, raisin):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, cream, egg, flour, nutmeg, raisin. 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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