Skip to main content
Dessert

Twelfth-cake

A large spiced fruit cake with currants, almonds, candied fruit, and brandy baked slowly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Twelfth-cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, cream butter until smooth.

  3. Gradually mix in the sugar and spices.

  4. Add eggs six at a time, beating well after each addition. Continue mixing for at least 20 minutes after the last egg.

  5. Stir in brandy, then gently fold in flour until just combined.

  6. Add currants, almonds, and candied fruit, mixing lightly.

Fill and bake

  1. Butter a cake tin and line it with buttered paper.

  2. Pour mixture into tin, filling it three-quarters full.

  3. Smooth top with a hand dipped in milk.

  4. To prevent burning, place a baking sheet with sawdust under the cake tin.

  5. Bake for 4 hours in the cool oven.

Finish

  1. Once nearly cool, ice and decorate as desired.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

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

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

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

  4. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten in gradually to aerate the batter and bind it into a rich, structured crumb.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add richness and tender texture.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the heavy fruit and batter together as it bakes.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender crumb when creamed with butter.
Currants
Add concentrated fruit sweetness and chewy texture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Beating in the eggs. Eggs added too quickly can curdle the butter-sugar mixture. Adding them gradually and beating well keeps the batter smooth and helps it hold air, which supports a light, even crumb in a dense fruit cake.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, egg, almond, lemon, orange. 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.

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesLemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesGinger CookiesGinger Cookies213 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipes