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Dessert

A Good Plain Cake

A simple cake made with flour, sugar, butter, eggs, milk, raisins, currants, citrus peel, and spices.

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 ↓

A Good Plain Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure. The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, salt, spice, and sugar.

  3. Rub in the softened butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

  4. Stir in the sultanas, currants, and sliced peel.

Make the batter

  1. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and milk together.

  2. Pour the egg mixture into the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.

  3. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 25‑30 minutes or until a toothpick 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. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Butter
Coats flour particles and adds tenderness and richness to the crumb.
Eggs
Add structure and help bind the batter as they set.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and contributes to browning and a tender crumb.
Sultanas and currants
Add sweetness, chewiness and moisture pockets throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Mixing the batter until just combined. Once liquid meets flour, gluten starts to form. Overmixing makes the cake tough and dense, so stop as soon as no dry flour streaks remain.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, cinnamon, sugar, butter, raisin, egg, milk. 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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