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Dessert

Poverty Cake

A moist cake made with sour milk, molasses, flour, raisins, spices, baking soda, eggs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Poverty Cake

Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Poverty Cake

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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the sour milk and molasses together.

  2. Add the flour, raisins, cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, baking soda, and eggs to the mixture, then stir until well combined.

Bake

  1. Grease a baking pan with butter and pour the batter into it.

  2. Bake for about 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sour milk
Reacts with the baking soda to lift the batter and adds tenderness.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture and a deep, dark colour to the cake.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to make the cake rise.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and pockets of sweetness throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Stir until well combined, then bake. Mixing the batter only until evenly combined keeps the crumb tender, while overmixing develops gluten and makes the cake tough. Baking soda needs to be mixed in promptly, since its rising reaction starts as soon as it meets the acidic liquid.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses, flour, raisin, clove, nutmeg, cinnamon):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Fennelfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, flour, raisin, clove, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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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