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Dessert

Connecticut Loaf Cake

A sweet loaf cake with raisins, nutmeg, cinnamon, and butter baked in a loaf pan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Connecticut Loaf 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.

Make the batter

  1. Warm the milk.

  2. Add the yeast and 2 cups of sugar.

  3. Stir to form a thick batter.

  4. Once the batter is light, add the beaten eggs.

  5. Add the remaining 2 cups of sugar, butter, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

Add the raisins and bake

  1. Seed the raisins and flour them well.

  2. Fold them into the batter.

  3. Let the batter rise in the tins until light.

  4. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until done.

  5. Once baked, frost the loaves.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  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

Yeast
Produces gas as it works, making the batter rise and turn light.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set in the bake.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.
Milk
Provides the liquid that hydrates the flour and keeps the crumb moist.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and softens the texture of the crumb.
Raisins
Add chewy sweetness distributed through the loaves.

The step that matters

Let the batter rise in the tins until light. Yeast needs time to ferment and trap gas in the dough. If the batter is not allowed to become light before baking, the loaves will stay dense and heavy.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, egg, butter, nutmeg, cinnamon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, egg, butter, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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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