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Dessert

Buckeye Cake

A sweet raisin cake with butter, sugar, flour, eggs, sour milk, baking soda, and optional sliced citron.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Buckeye 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. Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy.

Make the batter

  1. Add the egg yolks and sour milk, mixing well.

  2. Stir in the flour with the baking soda until combined.

  3. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

  4. Dredge the chopped raisins in a little flour and add to the mixture.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased six-quart pan or two large loaf pans.

  2. Bake for 1.5 hours or until a toothpick comes out clean.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  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. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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 trap air, giving the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and structure, and whipped whites lift the batter for a lighter texture.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to help the cake rise and keeps it moist.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to release gas, leavening the batter.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as it bakes.
Seeded raisins
Add chewy pockets of sweetness; dredging in flour helps keep them from sinking.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air that leavens the batter. Stirring them vigorously deflates the foam, so fold gently until just combined to keep the cake light.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

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