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Dessert

Cocoa-nut Pound Cake

A dense cake made with butter, sugar, eggs, cream, lemon essence, and grated coconut.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Hodgson, Mary, fl. 1855 · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cocoa-nut Pound Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Beat a quarter pound of butter and half a pound of the best white sugar to a cream.

  2. Add four tablespoons of cream, one tablespoon of the essence of lemon, one of flour, and three eggs. Beat until very light. Some persons omit the flour.

Add coconut and bake

  1. Grate the white meat of a coconut. Stir it lightly.

  2. Bake in tin pans.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

243Calories
7 gProtein
22 gFat
5 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12

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

By Hodgson, Mary, fl. 1855. 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.

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

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

  2. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  5. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Lemon and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 44,316 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

Butter
Creamed with sugar, it traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Eggs
Beaten in, they add structure and help the cake rise and set as it bakes.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the batter.
Coconut (in the method)
Grated coconut adds flavour and moisture to the finished cake.

The step that matters

Beat until very light. Beating the creamed butter, sugar and eggs traps air in the batter, which lifts the cake as it bakes. Under-beating leaves a denser, heavier crumb.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, cream, egg. 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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