Skip to main content
Dessert

A Rich Cake

A cake made with currants, almonds, spices, wine, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

A Rich Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA good oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a good oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cream the butter until smooth.

  3. Add the sugar to the creamed butter and mix the sugar and butter well.

  4. Beat the egg yolks, then strain the beaten yolks through a sieve.

  5. Incorporate the ground almonds into the mixture.

  6. Gradually add the beaten egg yolks to the mixture and mix thoroughly.

  7. Add the currants, flour, spices, sack, brandy, and sweetmeats to the mixture, then mix until combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a prepared baking pan.

  2. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Currant + macetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,791 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

Egg yolks
Add richness and structure as they set during baking, and bind the batter.
All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Unsalted butter
Adds tenderness and richness, and carries flavor through the crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, helps give it a light texture.
Jordan almonds
Add nutty flavor and body, with moisture from the ground almonds.
Currants
Add fruity sweetness and moist pockets throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Gradually add the beaten egg yolks. Adding the yolks slowly lets the butter and sugar emulsify with them. A smooth, stable mixture traps air and keeps the batter from curdling or separating.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

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