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Dessert

Ribbon Cake

A layered cake made with sugar, eggs, butter, milk, baking powder, flour, raisins, spices, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Ribbon 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Stir in the milk and baking powder.

  5. Gradually add the flour, mixing until smooth.

  6. Fold in the chopped raisins, cinnamon, spice, cloves, and molasses.

  7. Pour the batter into two greased cake pans.

Bake and assemble

  1. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

  2. Stack the layers with jelly or icing.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and creaming it with sugar traps air for a tender crumb.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as it sets during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender texture when creamed with butter.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness and a darker color to the cake.

The step that matters

Adding the eggs one at a time. Beating each egg fully into the creamed butter and sugar keeps the emulsion stable. A broken emulsion can cause a dense, greasy crumb and uneven rise.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Clovethe original
  4. Allspicefits about as well

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