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Ham Cake

A baked cake made from finely ground ham, pepper, mixed spice, and clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Ham and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,475 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Ham Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Pound the ham and fat very finely in a mortar.

  2. Season with pepper and mixed spice.

  3. Add enough clarified butter to make it moist.

Bake and serve

  1. Put the mixture into a mold.

  2. Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes.

  3. Prepare the day before serving.

  4. To unmold, place the mold in warm water for a few minutes.

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. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,058 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Remains of a dry ham
Provides the main meaty body and flavour of the cake.
Clarified butter
Adds fat and moisture so the pounded ham holds together and stays moist.
Mixed spice
Adds warm aromatic flavour to the ham.
Pepper
Adds sharp, gently pungent seasoning to the ham.

The step that matters

Add enough clarified butter to make it moist. Dry cured ham lacks moisture, so too little fat leaves the cake crumbly and dry after baking, while the fat helps bind the finely pounded meat.

“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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