Skip to main content
Dessert

Christmas Fruit Cake

A dense cake made with flour, butter, eggs, brandy, sugar, raisins, currants, prunes, figs, candied peel, almonds, and spices.

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

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 ↓

Christmas 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 your oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

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

  4. Stir in the brandy, flour, and mixed spice or nutmeg.

  5. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  6. Gently fold the egg whites into the batter.

  7. Add the raisins, currants, prunes, figs, candied peel, and almonds, mixing until evenly distributed.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and smooth the top.

  2. Bake for about 1.5 to 2 hours, or until a toothpick inserted in the center 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. Brandy + curranttop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Raisin + figtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

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

  5. Brandy + figtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together222 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Unsalted butter
Creams with the sugar to trap air and adds richness and tender texture.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and binding; whipped whites lighten the batter and aid rise.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, creamed texture with the butter.
Raisins, currants, prunes and figs
Add moisture, chewiness and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.
Brandy
Adds moisture and aroma, and its flavor carries through the baked fruit.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold air that lightens the batter. Stirring them in vigorously knocks that air out, leaving a denser cake, so fold gently until just combined.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, egg, brandy, sugar, raisin, fig. 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.

You might also like

Brandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesRed Currant JellyRed Currant Jelly65 recipesCurrant Ice CreamCurrant Ice Cream32 recipesAlmond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipes