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Dessert

Reception Cake

A buttery cake with currants, citron, orange peel, almonds, allspice, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and allspice work together. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 727 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Reception Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°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 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until creamy.

  3. Add the beaten eggs and mix well.

  4. In another bowl, combine the flour and baking powder.

  5. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture.

Flavour and bake

  1. Fold in the currants, citron, orange peel, and almonds.

  2. Season with allspice and cinnamon to taste.

  3. Pour the batter into a paper-lined cake tin.

  4. Bake in the preheated oven for about 1 hour 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. Orange + allspicetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together727 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Orange + almondtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Currant + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,359 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

  5. Almond + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together512 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 tender texture.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set.
All-purpose flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes lighter.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender crumb when creamed with butter.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit sweetness and chewy texture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture. Adding flour gradually and mixing only until combined keeps the batter smooth and emulsified. Overmixing once flour is in develops gluten, which can make the cake dense and tough.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, flour, orange, almond, allspice):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour, orange, almond, allspice. 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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