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Dessert

Nut Cake

A baked cake made with butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder, hickory nuts, orange rind, orange juice, and water.

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

Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Nut Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add the beaten yolks of the eggs and mix well.

  3. Stir in the flour mixed with baking powder.

  4. Fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites.

  5. Add the chopped nuts, orange rind, and orange juice.

Bake

  1. If baking as a solid cake, bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for 2 hours on a small stand.

  2. If baking in layers, bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 20 minutes.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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
Creamed with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and moisture; whites, whipped stiff, lift and give the cake its structure.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Hickory nut kernels
Add body, texture and nutty flavour to the crumb.
Orange juice
Adds moisture and bright acidity that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Folding in the stiffly beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold the air that makes the cake light. Folding gently, rather than stirring, keeps that air from collapsing, so the cake rises evenly in the oven.

Swap the orange

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour. 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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Hickory 164Chocolate 6Cocoa 6Sour Cream 5White 5Macaroons 3 See all 162 →

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