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Dessert

Tipsy Cake

A cake made of stale sponge cakes soaked in raisin wine and custard, topped with jam and dried fruits.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Tipsy Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Assemble

  1. Spread a little jam on each sponge cake.

  2. Arrange the cakes in a pile in the center of a deep glass dish.

Soak and finish

  1. Pour the raisin wine over the cakes until they absorb it, repeating until soaked.

  2. Pour the cold custard around the cakes.

  3. Garnish the dish with sliced dried fruits.

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. Raisin + winetop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,324 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

Sponge cakes
Act as the base that soaks up the wine and holds the dish's structure.
Raisin wine
Soaks into the cakes to add moisture and a boozy flavor.
Custard
Adds a cool, creamy layer that contrasts with the soaked cakes.
Jam
Adds sweetness and fruity flavor between the cakes.

The step that matters

Soaking the cakes with wine. Pour the wine gradually and let each addition absorb before adding more. Stale sponge is dry and porous, so it takes up liquid well, but pouring too fast floods the dish and leaves the cakes soggy on top and dry underneath.

“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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