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Dessert

Rich Fruit Cake

A dense cake made with flour, sugar, butter, raisins, citron, currants, molasses, almonds, eggs, milk, brandy, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 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 ↓

Rich Fruit Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

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

  3. Add the flour, molasses, and chopped almonds, and mix well.

  4. Dissolve the baking soda in the milk and add it to the mixture.

  5. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  6. Coat the raisins, citron, and currants with flour, then fold them into the batter.

  7. Add the brandy or jelly, nutmeg, cloves, and cinnamon, and mix until combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake for a long time until a toothpick inserted 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.

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. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  5. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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
Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich texture.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as the batter sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses and helps the cake rise and lighten.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Baking long enough at low heat. Dense fruit cakes need a slow, long bake so the center sets fully without the outside burning. Testing with a toothpick confirms the center is cooked through before cooling.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, raisin, molasses, almond, 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.

More fruit cake recipes

White 89Black 40Christmas 29Eggless 27Molasses 23Apple 17 See all 952 →

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