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Dessert

Black Layer Cake

A layered cake made with eggs, sugar, black strap molasses, flour, spices, and raisins.

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 ↓

Black Layer 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. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix the eggs, sugar, black strap molasses, and butter.

  3. In another bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, ginger, mixed spices, and baking soda.

  4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, then stir in the boiling water last.

Bake

  1. Bake in layers for about 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make and spread the filling

  1. For the filling, boil the sugar and milk together, then stir in the chopped raisins.

  2. Spread the filling between the layers and on top of the cake.

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. Ginger + raisintop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,242 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the oven.
Flour
Forms the cake's main structure once its starches set during baking.
Black strap molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, deep flavor, and dark color, and its acidity reacts with the baking soda.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas that lifts the cake.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking to help the cake rise further.
Chopped raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness to the filling.

The step that matters

Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, then stir in the boiling water last.. Mix only until the batter is combined, because overmixing flour develops gluten and makes the cake tough. Adding the boiling water last keeps the batter loose and evenly mixed.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Allspicefits about as well

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