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Dessert

Spice Cake

A spiced cake with raisins and a sugared filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Spice Cake

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Spice 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. In a bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the eggs, molasses, and sour milk, mixing well.

  4. In another bowl, combine the flour, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

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

Bake the cake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the filling and assemble

  1. For the filling, boil 1⅓ cups sugar and ½ cup water until it spins a thread.

  2. Pour the hot syrup over the beaten egg whites, then fold in the chopped raisins and vanilla.

  3. Spread the filling between the layers of the cooled 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.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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 and moisture to the crumb.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown and stay moist.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness and a dark colour to the cake.
Sour milk
Adds acidity that tenderises the crumb and balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Cooking the filling syrup to the thread stage. The syrup must reach the thread stage so its sugar concentration sets the filling. Pouring it hot onto the beaten whites cooks the egg proteins and stabilises the foam, so the filling holds its shape.

“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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