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 ↓
Apple Fruit 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.
Make the batter
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
Dissolve the baking soda in the milk and add it to the mixture.
Beat in the eggs, then gradually add the flour.
Stir in the raisins and chopped apples.
Stew the apples and bake
In a saucepan, stew the chopped apples in the molasses until soft.
Combine the stewed apples with the batter.
Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 1.5 hours.
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.
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Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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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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Milk + appletop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,104 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,225 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the cake's crumb together as it bakes.
- Butter
- Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich texture.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure and moisture as they set in the oven.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in molasses to release gas that lifts the batter.
- Molasses
- Adds moisture, deep sweetness, dark colour and a caramel-like flavour.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake, helps with creaming, and aids browning and moisture retention.
The step that matters
Dissolve the baking soda in the milk before mixing it in. Baking soda only lifts the cake when it is evenly dispersed and meets the acid in the molasses. If it stays in lumps, pockets of soda can taste bitter and the cake will rise unevenly.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, milk, egg, flour, raisin, molasses):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Datesfits about as well
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, milk, egg, flour, raisin, molasses. 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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