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Dried-apple or Economical Fruit-cake

A moist fruit cake made with dried apples, molasses, raisins, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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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 ↓

Dried-apple or Economical Fruit-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 fruit and spice mixture

  1. Soak the apples in water overnight.

  2. Drain and chop the soaked apples.

  3. In a saucepan, combine the chopped apples, molasses, and spices; bring to a boil, then simmer gently for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

  4. Let the molasses mixture cool.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Stir in the butter, sugar, egg, flour, and baking powder; beat for 3 to 4 minutes.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in a few drops of boiling water.

  4. Coat the raisins in flour and set aside.

  5. Beat in the dissolved baking soda for a minute, then gently stir in the raisins.

Bake

  1. Prepare two large loaf pans lined with greased parchment paper.

  2. Fill each pan halfway with batter.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for 15 minutes.

  4. Reduce the heat, cover with brown paper, and bake for an additional 30 minutes or until a skewer 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. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 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

Dried sour apples
Provide fruit pieces and tartness that flavour the cake through its dense crumb.
Molasses
Adds dark color, moisture, and deep sweetness while helping the crumb stay tender.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender texture.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses acidity to lift the batter and aid rising.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness.

The step that matters

Dissolving and folding in the baking soda. Baking soda must be dissolved fully and mixed in briefly so it reacts evenly with the acidic molasses; overbeating or uneven distribution can cause dense patches or a collapsed rise.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, apple, sugar, molasses, flour, raisin, cinnamon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, apple, sugar, molasses, flour, raisin, cinnamon. 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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