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Dessert

Plum or Currant Cake, Another Way

A sweet cake made with butter, sugar, currants, orange and lemon peel, almonds, brandy, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Plum or Currant Cake, Another Way

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the butter in a bowl until creamy.

  2. Stir in the powdered sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  3. Add the egg yolks one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Beat the egg whites until frothy and gently fold them into the mixture.

  5. Add the shredded orange and lemon peel, pounded almonds, and brandy, mixing well.

  6. Stir in the currants and flour, mixing as lightly as possible.

Bake

  1. Line a tin hoop with three sheets of paper around the sides and six at the bottom.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for three hours.

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. Cinnamon + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Cinnamon + orangetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Nutmeg + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creams with the sugar to trap air and give the cake a rich, tender crumb.
Egg yolks
Add richness, fat and emulsifying power that bind the batter.
Egg whites
Whipped to froth, they lighten the batter and help it rise in the oven.
All-purpose flour
Provides the starch and gluten that set the structure of the cake.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and adds tenderness by dissolving easily into the butter.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit sweetness and chewy pockets throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites and flour. Whipped egg whites hold air that gives lift, and overmixing the flour develops gluten, which makes the cake tough and dense. Fold gently and mix the flour as lightly as possible.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, egg, lemon, almond):

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, egg, lemon, 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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