Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Pound 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.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Line a round cake tin with buttered parchment paper.
Ensure the oven is well heated to prevent the currants from sinking.
Make the batter
Cream the butter in a large bowl.
Gradually add the flour and sugar, mixing well.
Stir in the currants, candied peel, and chopped almonds.
In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs and blend them with the dry mixture.
Beat the batter for 20 minutes until well combined.
Bake
Pour the batter into the prepared tin.
Bake for 1 to 2 hours.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,673 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,245 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Currant + macetop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,791 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Creams with sugar to trap air and adds richness and a tender crumb.
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the structure that sets the cake as the batter bakes.
- Granulated sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps hold air when creamed with the butter.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter, add moisture and help set the crumb as it bakes.
- Currants
- Add fruit flavour and sweetness; they sink if the batter is not set quickly.
The step that matters
Heat the oven well before baking. A well-heated oven sets the batter quickly at the start of baking, so the heavy currants are held in place rather than sinking to the bottom.
Swap the mace
The recipe marks mace as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, currant, egg, almond):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Allspicefits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sugar, currant, egg, almond. 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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