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Dessert

Plain Spice Cake

A simple cake made with lard, butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, spices, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Plain Spice Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the lard and butter with the sugar until smooth.

  2. Add the beaten egg and mix well.

  3. Stir in the milk, flour, salt, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, and baking soda.

  4. Beat the mixture well and pour it into a greased baking pan.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick comes out clean.

  2. Optionally, add raisins or nuts before baking.

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 + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  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

Baking soda
Reacts with the batter to produce gas, helping the cake rise and turn light.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake's crumb together as it sets.
Eggs
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness to the crumb.
Lard and butter
Add fat that tenderises the crumb and carries the spice flavour.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cake brown and stay moist.

The step that matters

Checking for doneness with a toothpick. Spice cakes can look set on top while the centre is still wet. Testing until a toothpick comes out clean confirms the crumb has fully set, so the cake does not sink or turn gummy as it cools.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, cinnamon, clove. 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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