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Dessert

Fruit Cake

Fruit cake made with currants, raisins, citron, spices, molasses, coffee, and butter.

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

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.

Prepare

  1. Sift together nutmeg, allspice, cloves, salt, cinnamon, flour, and baking powder.

  2. Add currants, raisins, and citron to the dry ingredients.

Make the batter

  1. Beat eggs into molasses, then cream butter with brown sugar.

  2. Combine the butter mixture with the molasses and beat well.

  3. Stir in strong coffee, then add the flour mixture.

Bake

  1. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for 2.5 hours, being careful not to burn.

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Allspice + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness by coating flour and carrying flavor.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness, moisture, and caramel notes to the crumb.
Baking powder
Releases gas that lifts the batter during baking.

The step that matters

Baking at a low temperature without burning. A slow oven lets the dense, sugar-rich batter cook through to the center before the outside darkens. Sugars and molasses brown quickly, so the cake can scorch if the heat is too high or the bake runs too long.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against nutmeg, allspice, clove, cinnamon, flour, raisin, 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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