Name: New England Election Cake
Ingredients: three pounds sifted flour; half pounds of sugar; one pound butter; one-half pint good home- made yeast; one pound raisins; six eggs; one glass brandy; cinnamon; mace

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 ↓

New England Election Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Mrs. John King, Jr. Take three pounds sifted flour, leaving out a pint to put
VALUABLE EB0IPE8. 329
l,m with fruit, and mix in warm milk till it is a stiff batter ; weigh one and a half pounds of sugar, one pound butter ; mix them to a cream, then mix one-half this with the batter of milk and flour, and one-half pint good home- made yeast ; beat very thoroughly together ; when light, which will take several hours in winter, better to mix at night and stand in a warm place till next morning, add the remainder of butter and sugar with six eggs and one pound raisins, one glass brandy, cinnamon, mace or nut- meg, as the taste, and a little soda; if in season of scarcity of eggs, it is very good without any ; should rise the second time before pouring in pans for baking. The more such cake is beaten the finer and lighter it will be.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

752Calories

20 gProtein

18 gFat

126 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 8 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Grape	1/2 cup (76g)	62
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Cinnamon	1 tsp ground (2.6g)	6
Brandy	not in our table	0
Mace	not in our table	0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.). 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. See the original page.

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.

Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,390 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,341 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,611 recipes

Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
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

Swap the mace

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

Nutmegfits better
Cardamomfits better
Clovefits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, raisin, egg, brandy, cinnamon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.