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Dessert

Farmer's Fruit Cake

A moist cake made with dried apples, molasses, spices, and raisins baked to a cup‑cake consistency.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,774 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Farmer's Fruit 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.

Prepare the apples

  1. Wash and soak the dried apples overnight in water.

  2. In the morning, drain the water and chop the apples.

  3. Combine the chopped apples and molasses in a pot and simmer for 2 hours until the molasses is absorbed.

  4. Let the mixture cool before adding it to the other ingredients.

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the brown sugar, butter, eggs, milk, baking soda, cream of tartar, cloves, allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, lemon rind, lemon juice, citron, and raisins.

  2. Add enough flour to achieve a consistency similar to cup cake batter.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan and bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) 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. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Dried apples
Provide bulk and moist, chewy fruit texture throughout the cake.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color and a rich, moist body to the cake.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets in the oven.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter, helping the baking soda react and supporting a lighter crumb.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.

The step that matters

Cooling the apple and molasses mixture. Adding the mixture while it is still hot can melt the butter and loosen the batter, and it may react unevenly with the leavening. Letting it cool first keeps the batter stable so the cake sets evenly.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, molasses, sugar, butter, egg, milk, cream):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, molasses, sugar, butter, egg, milk, cream. 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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