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Dessert

Twelfth-Night Cake

A cake made with butter, sugar, flour, milk, eggs, baking powder, orange extract, and a pea, bean, and clove.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,987 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Twelfth-Night Cake

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.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Butter a round pan with a tube in the middle and line it with unglazed white paper, cutting a hole for the tube.

  3. Measure out the butter, milk, and flour.

  4. Separate the eggs.

  5. Mix the baking powder into the flour.

  6. Warm the mixing bowl by filling it with hot water, then pour it out.

Make the batter

  1. Rub the butter to a soft cream.

  2. Gradually add the flour and orange extract.

  3. Beat the egg whites until light.

  4. Beat in the yolks.

  5. Rub the butter and sugar together until very light.

  6. Add the milk gradually.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into the prepared pan, filling it two inches deep.

  2. Bake for 3 to 4 hours, depending on the depth of the cake.

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. Orange + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,987 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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
Provides the structure that holds the cake's risen crumb together as it bakes.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to hold air and give a tender, rich texture.
Eggs
Whites are beaten to trap air, lifting the crumb; yolks add richness.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, when creamed, helps build a light, tender texture.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, making the cake rise and lighten.
Milk
Adds moisture and loosens the batter so it bakes evenly.

The step that matters

Rub the butter and sugar together until very light. Beating butter and sugar traps tiny air pockets in the fat. These expand in the oven and give the cake its lift and fine, tender crumb, so under-creaming leaves a dense cake.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

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