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Dessert

Pound Cake

A sweet cake made with equal parts butter, sugar, flour, and eggs, plus sultanas, lemon rind, and other flavorings.

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

Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Pound 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.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the butter until creamy.

  2. Gradually add the caster sugar and flour, beating well.

  3. Add each egg separately, mixing thoroughly.

  4. Continue adding flour and eggs until well combined.

  5. Stir in the sultanas, lemon rind, salt, candied peel, currants, and vanilla essence.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a cake tin lined with paper.

  2. Bake for about 2 hours in a moderate oven 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Lemon + vanillatop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Butter
Creamed with sugar, it traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Caster sugar
Sweetens the cake and, beaten with butter, helps hold air for a light texture.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as the eggs and heat firm the batter.
Eggs
Bind the batter, add richness, and help set the crumb as it bakes.
Sultanas
Add sweetness and moisture as dried fruit studded through the cake.

The step that matters

Adding each egg separately and mixing thoroughly. Adding eggs one at a time lets each one emulsify fully into the creamed butter and sugar. Adding them too fast can cause the batter to curdle, which weakens the air structure and can make the finished cake heavy.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Blueberryfits better
  2. Blackberryfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, flour, egg, lemon, vanilla. 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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