Skip to main content
Dessert

Wedding Cake— Mrs. Daniel Bradford

A large wedding cake made with flour, sugar, butter, raisins, citron, currants, molasses, brandy, eggs, spices, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Wedding Cake— Mrs. Daniel Bradford

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, mace, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg.

  5. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture, mixing until just combined.

  6. Fold in the raisins, citron, and currants.

  7. Stir in the molasses and brandy until well incorporated.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake slowly at first, then increase the heat as the cake rises, until a toothpick inserted 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. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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 heavy batter together as it bakes.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air, giving the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Sugar
Creams with butter to aerate the batter and adds sweetness and browning.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure, richness and lift as they set.
Currants
Add moisture, chew and concentrated fruit flavour throughout the cake.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness and color as it caramelizes in the oven.

The step that matters

Bake slowly at first, then increase the heat as the cake rises. A heavy, fruit-filled batter can set on the outside before the centre cooks through. Starting low lets the middle cook evenly, and raising the heat later helps the crust brown.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Currantthe original
  4. Applefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, raisin, molasses, brandy, egg. 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.

More wedding cake recipes

Black 6Fruit 5Rich 4Icing 4Pudding 4Montgomery 3 See all 105 →

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipes