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 ↓
French Loaf 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 the batter
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add the lemon juice and zest, and mix well.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg yolks and then add them to the mixture.
Stir in the raisins, wine, and grated nutmeg.
Fold and bake
In another bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, then fold them into the batter.
Gently fold in the flour until just combined.
Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan and bake immediately for about 60-70 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
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.
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Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together11,318 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,377 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Creamed with sugar to trap air, giving a light, tender crumb and rich flavour.
- Eggs
- Yolks add richness and moisture; whipped whites lighten the batter and help it rise.
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the wheat proteins and starch that set into the cake's structure as it bakes.
- Granulated sugar
- Sweetens the batter and, creamed with butter, helps create a light, fine texture.
- Raisins
- Add chewy pockets of sweetness and moisture throughout the loaf.
The step that matters
Folding the egg whites and flour. Whipped whites hold air that makes the cake rise; overmixing after adding them deflates that air and toughens the flour's gluten, leading to a dense, tough loaf.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, raisin, butter, egg, wine, nutmeg):
- Vanillafits about as well
- Figfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
- Applefits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, raisin, butter, egg, wine, 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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