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Dessert

Wilbur Cake

A moist coffee-flavored cake with currants, raisins, molasses, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Wilbur Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure. The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the cake

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix together the coffee sugar, sweet milk, flour, currants, raisins, molasses, butter, egg, cinnamon, cloves, and baking soda until well combined.

  3. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  4. Bake for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Make the icing

  1. For icing, combine ½ cup cocoa, ⅓ cup milk, ½ cup sugar, and the yolk of 1 egg in a saucepan.

  2. Boil until it reaches a jelly-like consistency.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Coffee + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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 cake together as it bakes.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds richness and structure to the crumb.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavour in the crumb.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark colour and a deep sweetness to the cake.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to lift the batter and help it rise.

The step that matters

Boiling the icing to a jelly-like consistency. Sugar and milk thicken as water evaporates and the mixture cools, so boiling too briefly leaves a runny icing while overboiling can make it grainy or hard. Watching the texture, not just the clock, gives a smooth, spreadable result.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (coffee, sugar, milk, flour, raisin, molasses, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against coffee, sugar, milk, flour, raisin, molasses, butter. 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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