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Dessert

Good Plum Cake

A moist cake made with flour, eggs, butter, sugar, milk, currants, candied peel, almonds, treacle, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Good Plum Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 300°F (150°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, beat the butter and sugar together until smooth and light.

  2. Add the treacle and mix well.

  3. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and gradually stir them into the mixture, beating continuously.

  4. Add the milk and mix until combined.

  5. Fold in the flour, currants, candied peel, and almonds until just incorporated.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake tin and bake for about 1 hour, or until a skewer inserted 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as the cake bakes.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and creamed with sugar it traps air for a tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light texture when creamed with butter.
Treacle
Adds moisture, deep sweetness and a rich, slightly bitter flavor.
Currants
Add fruit sweetness and chewy pockets throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Folding in the flour, currants, candied peel, and almonds. Overmixing once flour is added develops gluten, which can make the cake tough and dense. Fold gently and only until just incorporated.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, egg, butter, sugar, milk, almond, molasses. 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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