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Dessert

Dried Apple Cake

A cake made with dried apples, syrup or molasses, eggs, sugar, sweet milk, butter, baking soda, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Dried Apple Cake

Why it works: Syrup and sugar match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Dried Apple Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the apples

  1. Soak the dried apples in warm water overnight.

  2. Chop the apples slightly and simmer them in syrup or molasses for 1.5 hours.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix the eggs, sugar, sweet milk, and butter.

  2. Add the simmered apples and baking soda to the mixture.

  3. Gradually add flour until you achieve a stiff batter.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan and bake at 400°F (200°C) until done.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Dried apples
Provide the main fruit body and chewy texture once softened and simmered.
Syrup or molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture and a deep caramel-like flavor while softening the apples.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with acidic ingredients to produce gas that helps the cake rise and brown.
Flour
Forms the gluten and starch structure that holds the cake together.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the batter is stiff. Adding flour gradually lets you judge the batter's consistency. Too much flour at once can make the cake dense and tough, while too little leaves it wet and slow to set.

Swap the apple

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

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

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