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Dessert

White Fruit Cake

A light, fragrant cake made with butter, sugar, flour, egg whites, candied citron, almonds, coconut, white wine, and rose water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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White Fruit Cake

Why it works: Almond and coconut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,093 recipes. Both carry 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine, which smells cocoa, roasted. The science ↓

White Fruit Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

Make the batter

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

  2. Add the egg whites and mix well.

  3. Sift the flour and baking powder together, then gradually add to the mixture.

  4. Fold in the chopped citron, almonds, coconut, white wine, and rose water.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake for about 3 hours 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.

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. Almond + coconuttop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,093 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Almond + rosetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,465 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 the cake a light, tender crumb and rich flavor.
Egg whites
Add structure and help set the batter as it bakes.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as it sets in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and stays light.
Candied citron
Adds sweetness and chewy fruit texture throughout the cake.
Almonds
Add crunch and a nutty flavor to the crumb.

The step that matters

Baking for a long time at low heat. A long, low bake lets the centre set without the outside over-browning or drying out. Testing with a toothpick confirms the centre is fully cooked before cooling.

Swap the coconut

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Coconutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, flour, egg, almond, white wine, rose. 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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