Skip to main content
Dessert

Christmas Nut Loaf

A dense loaf made from mixed nuts, figs, molasses, and butter, baked and cooled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Fig and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Christmas Nut Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

Make the candy base

  1. In a saucepan, combine molasses and sugar, and boil until it forms a hard ball when tested in cold water.

  2. Add the butter and continue boiling until it is brittle when tested in cold water.

Set and serve

  1. Stir in the baking soda, chopped figs, vanilla extract, and slightly chopped nuts.

  2. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered mold and leave it in a cool place overnight.

  3. Turn out the loaf and cut it into slices.

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. Fig + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

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

  2. Walnut + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together993 recipes

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

  3. Almond + figtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

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

  4. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Walnut + figtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together373 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Provides dark colour, deep flavour and sweetness while helping the mixture set firm.
Sugar
Sweetens and, when boiled, cooks into a firm candy that holds the loaf together.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, softening the texture of the cooked sugar mixture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to lighten the loaf and add a slight rise.
Figs
Add chewy moisture and natural sweetness to the loaf.
English walnut meats
Add bulk, crunch and rich nutty flavour throughout the loaf.

The step that matters

Boiling the molasses and sugar to the hard ball and brittle stages. Sugar syrup changes texture sharply with temperature. Stopping too early leaves the loaf soft and sticky, while boiling too long makes it hard and bitter-tasting once cooled.

Swap the peanut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, walnut, almond, fig, butter, molasses, vanilla):

  1. Pistachiofits better
  2. Hazelnutfits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peanutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, walnut, almond, fig, butter, molasses, vanilla. 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

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesPeanut CandyPeanut Candy82 recipes