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Dessert

Fruit Cake

A baked cake made with raisins, currants, dates, citron, nuts, and rose water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and brazil nut share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68 recipes. Both carry 2-nonanone, which smells fruity, floral. The science ↓

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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Seed the raisins and cut the dates and citron into fine pieces.

  3. Blanch and chop the almonds.

  4. Dredge all the fruit with a little flour.

Mix and bake

  1. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.

  2. Pour the mixture into two greased cake pans.

  3. Bake 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. Almond + brazil nuttop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together68 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  2. Walnut + brazil nuttop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together66 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Almond + walnuttop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together993 recipes

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

  4. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Pecans + brazil nuttop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together40 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Baking powder
Releases gas that lifts the batter so the cake rises and stays light.
Dates
Add sweetness and moisture, helping the cake stay soft and dense.
Raisins
Add sweetness and moisture, contributing chewy texture throughout the cake.
Almonds
Add fat and crunch, and a nutty flavour that complements the fruit.

The step that matters

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean. The batter is dense with fruit and nuts, so it can look done on the outside while the centre is still wet. Testing the centre with a toothpick confirms the inside has set before the cake is removed from the oven.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, dates, almond, walnut, pecans, brazil nut, rose):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Vanillafits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, dates, almond, walnut, pecans, brazil nut, rose. 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 fruit cake recipes

White 89Black 40Christmas 29Eggless 27Molasses 23Apple 17 See all 952 →

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