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Dessert

Scripture Cake

A spiced cake made with butter, flour, sugar, raisins, figs, almonds, honey, cream, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Scripture 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, 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 honey and cream.

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

  5. Fold in the raisins, figs, and almonds.

  6. Add water and mix until smooth.

  7. Season with spices to taste.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for about 45-50 minutes, or 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.

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 + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Fig + almondtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Fig + honeytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together228 recipes

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

  5. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 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

Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air, giving a light, tender crumb and rich flavour.
Eggs
Bind the batter and set during baking, giving structure to the cake.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set in the oven.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, creamed texture with the butter.
Raisins
Add chewy moisture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.
Figs
Add soft moisture and natural sweetness to the crumb.

The step that matters

Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for about 45-50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.. Baking long enough sets the eggs and flour so the centre is cooked; the toothpick test checks this, since a wet centre means the cake will sink or be gummy.

Swap the fig

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, raisin, almond, egg, honey):

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Figthe original
  3. Coconutfits less well
  4. Peachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sugar, raisin, almond, egg, honey. 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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