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Dessert

Fruit Pound Cake

A pound cake made with fruit, butter, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,437 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Fruit Pound Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

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

  2. Line your baking pan with buttered paper.

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, sugar, melted butter, currants or raisins, orange peel, caraway seeds, ground cinnamon or ginger, and baking soda.

  2. Dissolve the baking soda in the milk and add it to the mixture.

  3. Stir in the juice of the lemons until well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake until golden.

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. Orange + cinnamontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Caraway + cinnamontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together188 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Flour + carawaytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  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

All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the crumb feel moist and soft.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps the crust brown as it bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the lemon juice to lift and open the batter.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that activates the baking soda and brightens the flavor.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps dissolve the baking soda evenly through the batter.

The step that matters

Dissolve the baking soda in the milk. Baking soda must be fully dissolved and spread evenly through the batter so it reacts with the acid in the lemon juice. Clumps can leave bitter spots and uneven rising.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, butter, orange, caraway, cinnamon, milk):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, orange, caraway, cinnamon, milk. 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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