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Dessert

Federal Cake

A spiced raisin cake made with butter, sugar, flour, sour milk, wine, brandy, raisins, citron, citrus peel, cloves, cinnamon, mace, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Federal Cake

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 ↓

Federal 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  3. Stir in the sour milk and the wine and brandy.

  4. Gradually add the flour, mixing until just combined.

  5. Fold in the raisins, citron, orange and lemon peel, cloves, cinnamon, mace, and grated nutmeg.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) 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.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Brandy + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

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

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

Butter
Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Sugar
Creaming with butter aerates the batter and adds sweetness and browning.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set in the oven.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake and the fruit together as it bakes.
Raisins
Provide chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.
Sour milk
Its acidity tenderizes the crumb and reacts with leavening to lift the batter.

The step that matters

Gradually add the flour, mixing until just combined. Overmixing flour develops gluten, which makes the cake tough and dense. Mixing only until combined keeps the crumb tender.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Apricotfits less well

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