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Dessert

Black Fruit Cake

A moist cake made with butter, molasses, brown sugar, spices, baking soda, currants, raisins, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

Black Fruit 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 the batter

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar.

  3. Add molasses and eggs, mixing well.

  4. Stir in spices: nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, all-spice.

  5. Dissolve baking soda in a small amount of water and add to mixture.

  6. Fold in currants and raisins.

  7. Gradually add flour until batter is very stiff.

Bake

  1. Pour batter into greased cake pan and bake for about 1 hour.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Butter
Creams with sugar to add richness and a tender crumb.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep, slightly bitter sweetness.
Eggs
Bind the batter and give structure as the cake sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with molasses acidity to help the cake rise.
Flour
Builds the structure that holds the batter together when baked.
Currants
Add chewy pockets of fruit sweetness throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until batter is very stiff. Adding flour gradually and mixing only until combined keeps the batter from overdeveloping gluten, which would make the cake tough. Stiffness helps the fruit stay suspended during baking.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, molasses, sugar, nutmeg, 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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