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Dessert

Fig Cake

A layered cake made with figs, raisins, and a fruit filling.

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 ↓

Fig 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.

Prepare the cake batter

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

  2. In a large bowl, cream together the sugar and butter. Add the eggs and milk, mixing well.

  3. Sift together the flour and baking powder, then gradually add to the mixture.

Bake and make the filling

  1. Divide the batter into three layers and bake until golden.

  2. For the filling, combine figs, raisins, lemon juice, water, and sugar in a saucepan. Boil until the mixture jellies, then let it cool.

  3. Spread the filling between the cooled layers of cake.

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

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

  3. Fig + raisintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Milk + figtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Fig + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together763 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the cake crumb.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake layers.
Royal baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the layers rise.
Figs
Provide the bulk, sweetness and body of the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown and set.

The step that matters

Boil the filling until it jellies. Figs, raisins and lemon juice contain natural pectin, which sets the filling only after enough liquid has boiled off. Stop too early and the filling stays runny and soaks into the layers; boil too long and it turns stiff and sticky.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Peachfits better
  3. Apricotfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, flour, egg, butter, milk, fig, raisin. 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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