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Dessert

A Rich Seed Cake

A dense cake made with flour, butter, sugar, eggs, caraway seeds, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

A Rich Seed Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make the batter

  1. Beat the butter until creamy.

  2. Add the sugar and mix well.

  3. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff, then fold them into the butter and sugar mixture.

  4. Beat the egg yolks and mix them in with the whites.

  5. Gradually fold in the flour, spices, and caraway seeds.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a prepared pan and bake for 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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Caraway + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together200 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Caraway + cinnamontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together188 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Flour + carawaytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor.
Eggs
Whites trap air for lift, and yolks add richness and set the crumb.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the butter hold air when creamed.
Caraway seeds
Contribute the distinctive aroma and flavor of the cake.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air only while they are stiff, so folding them in gently keeps the batter light and helps the cake rise instead of going dense.

Swap the caraway

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

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Carawaythe original

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