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Wedding Cake

A loaf cake made with flour, sugar, butter, raisins, currants, citron, spices, eggs, wine, brandy, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Wedding Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

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

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

  2. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  3. Stir in the flour, raisins, currants, citron, nutmeg, mace, and cloves.

  4. Mix in the wine, brandy, and molasses until well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into two greased loaf pans.

  2. Bake for 2 to 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.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  5. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set in the oven.
Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air and adds tenderness and richness to the crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the fruit and batter together as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness, and color to the cake.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean. A long, low bake is needed so the dense, fruit-heavy batter cooks through in the center. Testing the center with a toothpick shows whether the batter has set; pulling the cake too early leaves it gummy.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, butter, raisin, nutmeg, mace, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, raisin, nutmeg, mace, clove. 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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