Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓
Soda 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 the batter
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Rub the butter or dripping into the flour.
Add the sugar, currants, and mace and nutmeg.
Beat the egg well and mix it with the dry ingredients.
Leave 1 tablespoon of buttermilk to dissolve the bicarbonate of soda.
Add the dissolved bicarbonate to the batter and mix well.
Bake
Pour the mixture into a greased mold.
Bake for 30 to 60 minutes, pricking with a skewer to check doneness.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,557 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + buttermilktop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,721 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Sugar + buttermilktop 9% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,973 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the starch and gluten network that gives the cake its structure.
- Butter or beef dripping
- Fat coats the flour particles, tenderizing the crumb and adding richness.
- Castor sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps give the crumb a soft, fine texture.
- Egg
- Binds the batter and adds structure and moisture as it sets in the oven.
- Buttermilk
- Adds moisture and acidity that reacts with the bicarbonate of soda.
- Bicarbonate of soda
- Reacts with the buttermilk's acid to release carbon dioxide, which makes the cake rise.
The step that matters
Add the dissolved bicarbonate to the batter and mix well. Bicarbonate starts releasing carbon dioxide as soon as it meets the acid in buttermilk. Mixing it in evenly and without delay spreads those gas bubbles through the batter so the cake rises uniformly rather than unevenly.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, sugar, currant, egg, buttermilk, nutmeg):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Allspicefits better
- Cardamomfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, currant, egg, buttermilk, nutmeg. 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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