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Dessert

Scripture Cake

A baked cake made with butter, sugar, eggs, water, flour, baking powder, raisins, figs, almonds, honey, salt, and spices.

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

Scripture Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

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

  2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Make the batter

  1. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  2. Stir in the water, then gradually add the flour and baking powder.

  3. Fold in the raisins, figs, almonds, honey, salt, and spices.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake for about 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center 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 + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Fig + almondtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

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

  4. Fig + honeytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together228 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air and add richness and tenderness to the crumb.
Sugar
Creams with butter for a light structure and adds sweetness and browning.
Eggs
Add structure and binding, helping the batter set as it bakes.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cake rise and turn light.
Raisins
Add sweetness and moisture to the finished cake.

The step that matters

Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beating sugar into butter traps air bubbles that expand in the oven and give the cake lift. Under-creaming leaves a dense texture, so beat until the mixture visibly lightens.

Swap the fig

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

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Figthe original
  3. Coconutfits less well
  4. Peachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour, raisin, almond, honey. 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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