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Cocoa-nut Loaf-cake

A moist coconut loaf cake made with butter, milk, eggs, flour, sugar, cocoa-nut, lemon, nutmeg, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Cocoa-nut Loaf-cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the batter

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

  2. Add the egg yolks and beat well.

  3. Mix in the milk, then add the flour and lemon juice and rind, beating well.

  4. Stir in the grated cocoa-nut.

  5. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff, then sift the baking powder over them.

  6. Gently fold the egg whites into the batter just before baking.

Bake and finish

  1. Prepare 2 loaf pans by lining them with thin, greased paper.

  2. Divide the batter between the pans, filling them no more than halfway.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

  4. If the cake browns too quickly, cover it with thick paper.

  5. Once baked, remove from the oven and cover the top with fresh grated cocoa-nut and sifted powdered sugar.

  6. Let cool on a sieve, handling carefully, and remove the paper once cool.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cocoatop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together643 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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, giving the cake a light, tender crumb and rich flavour.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and structure, while whipped whites lift the batter and help it rise.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cake rise and become light.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, fluffy creamed base.
Grated cocoa-nut
Adds moisture, chew and coconut flavour to the crumb.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold air that lightens the batter. Folding gently, just before baking, keeps that air from collapsing, so the cake rises well and stays light.

Swap the cocoa

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits better
  3. Milletfits better
  4. Cocoathe original

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

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