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Dessert

Fruit Cake

A dense, spiced cake with raisins, currants, citron slices, and a rich butter‑sugar base, baked slowly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Fruit Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Cream together the sugar and butter until smooth.

  2. Add the treacle and mix well.

  3. Beat the egg whites and yolks separately, then combine them with the butter and sugar mixture.

  4. Gradually add the flour mixed with cream of tartar.

  5. Dissolve the baking soda in a little boiling water and add it to the mixture.

  6. Stir in the ground cloves, mace, nutmeg, brandy, lemon juice, and lemon rind.

  7. Fold in the raisins and currants mixed with the additional flour.

Bake

  1. Layer the cake batter in a baking tin, alternating with layers of citron slices.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for at least three hours.

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. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 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
Whites and yolks beaten separately add air and lift, giving a light crumb.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and give a rich, tender texture.
Sugar
Creamed with butter for structure and sweetness, and aids browning.
Flour
Forms the main structure that holds the batter and fruit together.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in cream of tartar and treacle to help the cake rise.
Raisins and currants
Add moisture, sweetness and chewy texture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Baking the layered batter. Fruit and citron sink toward the bottom of a heavy batter, and a long, gentle bake lets the cake set through without drying or burning the outside. Check the centre is set before removing it.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, flour, cream, clove, nutmeg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, flour, cream, clove, nutmeg. 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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