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Dessert

Good Simnel Cake

A fruitcake with sultanas, currants, candied peel, almond paste, and spices, baked in a round tin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Good Simnel 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. Rub the butter into the flour.

  2. Add all the dry ingredients and mix well.

Make the dough

  1. Cream the yeast.

  2. Add the milk and egg yolks.

  3. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture.

  4. Pour in the milk mixture.

  5. Mix into a soft paste.

  6. Set the mixture to rise in a warm place for two hours.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line a round cake tin with thick paper.

  2. Pour in half of the cake mixture.

  3. Place a layer of almond paste in the center.

  4. Pour in the remaining cake mixture.

  5. Bake for two hours at 350°F (175°C).

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its starches set during baking.
Butter
Rubbed into the flour, it coats the flour and tenderizes the crumb while adding richness.
Egg yolks
Add richness, color, and structure, helping bind the dough.
Yeast
Produces gas during the rise, lightening the dough.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and yeast to form a soft, workable dough.
Castor sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cake brown during baking.

The step that matters

Set the mixture to rise in a warm place. Yeast works best at a warm, steady temperature. If the place is too cold the dough rises slowly, and if it is too hot the yeast can die, leaving a dense cake.

Swap the currant

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

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

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