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Dessert

Oatmeal Drop Cakes

A baked oatmeal cake made with syrup, flour, sugar, raisins, and oats.

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 ↓

Oatmeal Drop Cakes

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).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the syrup, flour, brown sugar, salt, shortening, baking powder, and egg until well combined.

  2. Stir in the raisins and rolled oats.

Bake

  1. Drop the mixture by teaspoonfuls onto a greased baking sheet, placing them 1 inch apart.

  2. Bake for about 15 minutes or until delicately browned.

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. Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cookies together as they bake.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the drops rise and become light.
Egg
Binds the ingredients together and adds structure as it sets in the oven.
Shortening
Adds fat that tenderizes the texture and carries flavor through the batter.
Syrup
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the drops brown as they bake.
Rolled oats
Give the drops a chewy, hearty texture and absorb some of the batter's moisture.

The step that matters

Spacing the drops 1 inch apart. This batter spreads as it bakes, and the baking powder makes it rise. Drops placed too close can merge, change shape, and bake unevenly, so leaving room between them lets each one set separately.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (syrup, flour, sugar, egg, oats):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Blueberryfits less well
  4. Datesfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against syrup, flour, sugar, egg, oats. 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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