Skip to main content
Dessert

Cherry Cakes

A baked cake made with flour, eggs, dried cherries, sugar, butter, brandy, baking powder, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cherry Cakes

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.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Add the sugar and beat well.

  3. Beat the eggs separately, then add them alternately with the flour to the butter and sugar mixture.

  4. Fold in the halved dried cherries and baking powder.

  5. If necessary, add a little milk to achieve the right consistency.

  6. Stir in the brandy last.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into well-greased tins.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for fifteen minutes.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cakes together as they set.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, and help the batter bind and rise.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and richer flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the cakes and helps create a soft, tender texture when creamed.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the oven, helping the cakes rise and become light.
Dried cherries
Add chewy pockets of fruit sweetness and tartness throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Folding in the dried cherries and baking powder. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour, making the cakes tough and dense. Gentle folding keeps the batter light so the baking powder can lift it evenly.

“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

Brandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesBrandy CreamBrandy Cream21 recipesBrandy PuddingBrandy Pudding13 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipes