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Dessert

Black Cake

A spiced fruit cake made with brown sugar, butter, sweet milk, flour, spices, raisins, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Black 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a mixing bowl, cream together the brown sugar and butter until smooth.

  3. Add the sweet milk and mix well.

  4. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, cinnamon, allspice, and cloves.

  5. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until combined.

  6. Fold in the egg yolks and chopped raisins.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for about 30-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center 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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps give the cake its dark color and molasses flavor.
Butter
Creams with the sugar to add fat and a tender crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Cream of tartar
Acidic powder that works with baking soda to help the cake rise.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic ingredients to produce gas that lightens the batter.
Egg yolks
Add richness, fat and emulsifying power that help bind the batter.

The step that matters

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture. Adding dry ingredients slowly and stirring only until combined keeps the batter smooth and helps the leavening spread evenly. Overmixing once flour is in develops gluten, which can make the cake dense and tough.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicethe original
  4. Gingerfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, flour, cream, cinnamon, clove. 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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