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Dessert

Simnel Cake

A fruit cake with almond paste layers, spiced with ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, and flavored with vanilla, ratafia, orange‑flower water, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 21 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg 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 ↓

Simnel Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Prepare the almond paste first by pounding the almonds, then mixing with sugar, flavorings, and enough slightly beaten egg to form a firm consistency.

  2. Clean the fruit.

Make the cake batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a little flour to prevent curdling.

  3. Stir in the remaining flour, spices, baking powder, and salt until well combined. Ensure the mixture is of stiff consistency.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place half the mixture into a greased and lined cake tin.

  2. Add a layer of almond paste on top, then cover with the remaining mixture.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 2.5 to 3 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. Once cooled, add the remaining almond paste on top and decorate with icing balls if desired.

  2. Dust with icing sugar before serving.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

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

  5. Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the cake crumb.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavour when creamed with sugar.
Ground almonds
Provide moisture, nutty flavour and a dense texture in the almond paste layer.
Sultanas
Add sweetness and moist, chewy pockets of fruit throughout the cake.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit flavour and chewy texture to the batter.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter to help the cake rise and lighten.

The step that matters

Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a little flour. Adding eggs gradually and mixing in flour helps the emulsion stay stable. Without this, the batter can curdle, which may make the cake heavy or greasy.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, sugar, ginger, cinnamon, raisin, nutmeg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, ginger, cinnamon, raisin, nutmeg. 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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