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Dessert

Bath Cakes

A sweet, fragrant cake flavored with caraway seeds, brandy, white wine, and rose water, topped with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Bath Cakes

Why it works: Flour and caraway match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,435 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Bath Cakes

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.

Make the dough

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

  2. Add the flour and caraway seeds, mixing well.

  3. Stir in the brandy, white wine, and rose water to form a paste.

  4. Roll out the dough thinly on a floured surface.

Bake

  1. Brush the surface with egg white or rose water and sprinkle with sugar.

  2. Bake on a buttered baking sheet in a 400°F (200°C) oven until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Brandy + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together620 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Caraway + rosetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together93 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Butter
Creams with the sugar to give a light, tender crumb and rich flavour.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the rolled dough together as it bakes.
Caraway seeds
Contribute the characteristic aromatic flavour of the cakes.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour while helping bind the dough into a paste.
Egg white
Brushed on the surface to give a glossy finish and help the sugar stick.
Sugar
Sweetens the dough and, sprinkled on top, caramelises to a golden crust.

The step that matters

Roll out the dough thinly. Thin dough bakes through quickly and crisps at the edges, while thick dough can stay doughy in the centre. Rolling on a floured surface also keeps the dough from sticking.

Swap the caraway

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, flour, brandy, white wine, rose, egg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Carawaythe original
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, flour, brandy, white wine, rose, egg. 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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