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Dessert

Jumbles

A cake made with dried apples, molasses, flour, butter, sugar, sour milk, eggs, baking soda, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,774 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Jumbles

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the apples

  1. Chop the dried apples.

  2. Simmer the chopped apples in the molasses until cold.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour, butter, sugar, sour milk, eggs, and baking soda.

  2. Add the cooled apple mixture and spices to the batter.

Bake

  1. Pour into a greased baking dish.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) 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. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

  3. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

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

  4. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Forms the cake's structure once mixed with liquids and eggs.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness with a robust flavor.
Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set firm as it bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that lightens the cake.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich, smooth crumb.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds tenderness.

The step that matters

Simmer the apples in the molasses until cold. Cooking the dried apples softens them and lets them absorb molasses, so they stay moist rather than drying out the cake. Cooling before mixing keeps the batter from warming early, which would affect how the baking soda reacts.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, molasses, flour, butter, sugar, milk, 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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