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Dessert

Marguerites, or Jelly Cakes

A light cake made with sugar, butter, eggs, flour, spices, rose water, topped with jam and a powdered sugar icing.

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 ↓

Marguerites, or Jelly Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Rub sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.

  2. Beat egg yolks until thick, then sift in flour, spices, and rose water.

  3. Stir mixture well and roll it out to about ¼ inch thick.

  4. Cut out the cakes and bake them for a few minutes until pale brown.

Ice and finish

  1. Once cooled, spread peach jam or marmalade on each cake.

  2. Beat reserved egg whites until light, then gradually add powdered sugar until thick.

  3. Flavor icing with lemon or rose water and spoon onto each cake, creating a high center.

  4. Bake the iced cakes briefly until set.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air, giving the cakes a light, tender crumb and rich flavor.
Sugar
Creams with butter for lightness and adds sweetness and gentle browning.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cakes once it sets during baking.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the dough; whites whipped into the icing give it volume and a set, glossy top.
Peach jam or marmalade
Adds fruity sweetness and a sticky layer that helps the icing adhere.
Powdered sugar
Thickens the whipped egg white icing so it holds a high center.

The step that matters

Baking the iced cakes briefly until set. Baking only until the icing sets matters because overbaking dries the meringue-like egg white topping and can brown it too far before the cake is done.

Swap the mace

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, rose. 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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