Why it works: Raisin and flour 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 ↓
Spice 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 the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy.
Add the eggs and mix well.
Stir in the sweet milk and raisins.
In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and spices.
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 30-40 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.
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.
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Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,390 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, helps give it a light, tender crumb.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and tenderness, and traps air when creamed with sugar.
- Eggs
- Add structure and binding, helping the batter hold together as it bakes.
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidic ingredient that stabilises the batter and works with baking soda to help it rise.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that lifts the cake.
The step that matters
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined.. Once flour meets liquid, gluten begins to form. Stirring only until combined keeps the crumb tender rather than tough and dense.
Swap the cinnamon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, raisin, milk, flour, egg, cream):
- Cinnamonthe original
- Nutmegfits about as well
- Capersfits less well
- Jalapenofits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, raisin, milk, flour, egg, cream. 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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