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Dessert

Rochester Jelly Cake

A sponge cake flavored with molasses and spices, layered with jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 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 ↓

Rochester Jelly Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix sugar, eggs, butter, milk, flour, cream of tartar, and baking soda dissolved in milk.

  3. Divide the mixture in half.

  4. In one half, add molasses, raisins or currants, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, nutmeg, and flour.

Bake and assemble

  1. Pour both mixtures into shallow tins and bake until golden.

  2. While warm, layer the cakes with jelly in between.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cakes set in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavour.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter so it reacts with baking soda to lift the cake.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic cream of tartar to produce gas that makes the cake rise.
Raisins or currants
Add chewy sweetness and fruit flavour to the spiced half.
Molasses
Adds dark colour, moisture and a deep, slightly bitter sweetness.

The step that matters

Baking the two layers until golden. Shallow layers bake quickly, so overbaking dries them and makes the cakes crumbly. Pulling them once golden keeps them moist enough to layer with jelly.

Swap the raisin

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

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

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