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Dessert

Fig or Date Filling for Cake

A sweet filling made from figs, raisins, sugar, butter, egg yolks, corn starch, nutmeats, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Fig and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fig or Date Filling for Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the fruit

  1. Cover figs and raisins with water and cook until tender.

  2. Remove fruit from water and chop finely.

  3. Return chopped fruit to the same water.

Make the filling

  1. Add sugar, butter, egg yolks, and corn starch to the fruit mixture and beat thoroughly.

  2. Stir until a thick paste forms.

  3. Once cool, add chopped nutmeats and vanilla extract.

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. Fig + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

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

  2. Fig + raisintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Fig + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together66 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Figs
Provide the main fruit body and sweetness, softened by cooking into a spreadable base.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy moisture to the filling.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the filling as it cooks into a thick paste.
Corn starch
Thickens the fruit mixture so it sets into a paste rather than staying runny.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the filling a glossy, spreadable body.

The step that matters

Stir until a thick paste forms. Cornstarch thickens only when heated with liquid until the starch granules swell and gel. Stopping too early leaves the filling runny, while overcooking can make it stiff or scorch on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fig, sugar, butter, egg, corn, vanilla):

  1. Peachfits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, sugar, butter, egg, corn, vanilla. 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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