Skip to main content
Dessert

Black Cake

A dense fruit cake made with flour, currants, raisins, figs, molasses, brandy, spices, and jam.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Black 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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°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 molasses and sour cream mixed with baking soda.

  4. Gradually add the flour, mixing until just combined.

  5. Fold in the currants, raisins, citron, figs, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, and jam.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake for about 1.5 to 2 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + figtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Currant + figtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together276 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the dense, fruit-filled crumb together.
Butter
Creaming with sugar traps air and adds richness and tender texture.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and moisture as they set in the oven.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour cream and molasses to lift the batter as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark colour and a deep, slightly bitter sweetness.
Sour cream
Adds moisture and acidity, which activates the baking soda and tenderizes the crumb.

The step that matters

Bake low and slow until a toothpick comes out clean. A dense batter packed with fruit heats slowly at the centre. Underbaking leaves a gummy middle, while a long, low bake lets the centre set without scorching the outside.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Datesfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, raisin, sugar, fig, butter, egg, molasses. 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.

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipes