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Dessert

Jenny Lind Cake

A spiced molasses cake with a white and dark batter layered and frosted.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Jenny Lind 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.

Prepare the batter

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

  2. In a large bowl, mix sugar, milk, flour, eggs, and baking powder until smooth.

  3. Divide the batter into three parts, reserving less than a third for the dark layer.

  4. To the reserved batter, add molasses, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, and a little more flour to thicken.

Bake and assemble

  1. Pour the white batter into two greased cake pans and the dark batter into one.

  2. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

  3. Once cooled, layer the cakes and frost with a thin frosting.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the layers together as they bake.
Eggs
Bind the batter and help set the crumb as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
Molasses
Adds dark color, moisture, and a deep sweet flavor to the dark layer.
Sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps brown the crust while baking.

The step that matters

Dividing the batter and thickening the dark layer. The dark batter is made from a smaller portion, so it must be thickened with flour to stay stiff enough to layer without bleeding into the white batter. Too thin a dark batter can blur the layers and bake unevenly.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, milk, flour, egg, molasses, cinnamon, nutmeg):

  1. Cardamomfits about as well
  2. Allspicefits about as well
  3. Clovethe original
  4. Gingerfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, flour, egg, molasses, cinnamon, nutmeg. 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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