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New England Election Cake

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

New England Election Cake

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large bowl, mix 3 pounds of sifted flour with warm milk until you have a stiff batter, reserving 1 pint of flour.

  2. In another bowl, cream together 1½ pounds of sugar and 1 pound of softened butter.

  3. Combine half of the creamed mixture with the batter and add ½ pint of homemade yeast. Mix thoroughly.

  4. Let the mixture rise in a warm place for several hours, preferably overnight.

  5. Once risen, add the remaining butter and sugar, 6 eggs, 1 pound of raisins, ⅓ cup of brandy, cinnamon, mace or nutmeg to taste, and ¼ teaspoon of baking soda.

  6. If eggs are scarce, you can omit them. Beat the mixture well to ensure it is light and fluffy.

  7. Allow the batter to rise a second time before pouring it into baking pans.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Swap the mace

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, egg, raisin, brandy, cinnamon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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