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Dessert

Coffee or Moka Cake

A moist cake made with butter, sugar, flour, coffee, and dried fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Coffee or Moka Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Sift the baking powder and spices with the flour into a bowl.

  2. Add the sugar and butter, then rub them together well.

Make the batter

  1. Make a well in the center, pour in the syrup, and add the coffee.

  2. Break in the eggs and beat the mixture well.

  3. Mix in the other ingredients with a strong wooden spoon, adding a little milk if the mixture is not moist enough.

  4. Fold in the fruit last.

Bake

  1. Bake in a square cake pan lined with parchment paper at 350°F (175°C) for about 1 to 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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Butter and flour 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 main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness by coating flour and shortening the crumb.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and moisture as they set.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
Golden syrup
Adds sweetness, moisture and a deep golden flavor that keeps the cake soft.
Strong cold coffee
Contributes liquid and a deeper, slightly bitter aroma that complements the spices.

The step that matters

Mixing in the other ingredients. Mixing too vigorously after the flour is added develops gluten, which can make the cake tough. Mix only until combined, adding milk only if the batter is too stiff.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, syrup, flour, egg, nutmeg, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, syrup, flour, egg, nutmeg, clove. 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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