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Dessert

Vinegar Cake

A baked cake made with flour, raisins, butter, mixed peel, sugar, milk, soda, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Vinegar Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, raisins, butter, mixed peel, and sugar well.

  2. Dissolve the carbonate of soda in the warm milk and add it to the mixture along with the vinegar. Mix until well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake for 2 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Forms the structure of the cake as the batter sets in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavour.
Carbonate of soda
Reacts with the vinegar to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Vinegar
Reacts with the carbonate of soda, releasing gas that lightens the batter.
Raisins
Add moisture and sweetness through the cake.
Moist sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown and stay moist.

The step that matters

Dissolving the carbonate of soda and adding the vinegar. The soda and vinegar react quickly to release gas, so the batter should be mixed and baked promptly, before the gas escapes and the cake rises less.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, sugar, milk, vinegar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Peachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, milk, vinegar. 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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