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Dessert

Confectionery Cake

A sweet cake made with sugar, butter, flour, milk, egg whites, raisins, citron, molasses, cinnamon, cloves, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Confectionery 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 the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.

  3. Add the flour, milk, and baking powder, mixing well.

  4. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, then fold them into the batter.

Make the fruit layer

  1. For the fruit mixture, combine 1 tablespoon of the cake batter with the raisins, citron, molasses, cinnamon, cloves, and brandy.

  2. Divide the batter into three layers, two light and one dark.

Bake and assemble

  1. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

  2. Once cooled, layer the cakes and frost with soft frosting.

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 + cinnamontop 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. Milk + cinnamontop 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

Butter
Creams with the sugar to add tenderness and a rich flavor to the crumb.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the batter and help the cake rise and set.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, leavening the batter so the layers rise.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness to the dark layer.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor to the fruit mixture used for the dark layer.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stiff whites hold air that lightens the batter. Overmixing when folding knocks that air out, so the layers bake up denser and less airy.

“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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