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 ↓
Drop 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.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
Add the eggs, baking powder, and milk, and mix well.
Stir in the flour, raisins or currants, lemon extract, and nutmeg until combined.
Bake
Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto greased baking sheets.
Bake until golden brown.
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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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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 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
- Butter
- Creams with sugar to trap air and add richness and tenderness.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure as the cakes set.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter so the cakes rise and lighten.
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the cakes as the batter sets.
- Raisins or currants
- Add chewy pockets of fruit sweetness throughout the cake.
The step that matters
Dropping the batter onto the baking sheets. Spoonfuls spread slightly as they bake, so they should be spaced apart. Batter piled too tightly or too thick may bake unevenly, stay doughy in the middle, or fuse together at the edges.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, raisin, nutmeg):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
- Coconutfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, raisin, 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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