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 ↓
Hartford Election 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.
Make the dough
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
Rub the shortening lightly into the flour.
Add the yeast and enough milk to make a soft batter.
Let the batter rise until very light.
Mix and bake
Stir in the eggs, sugar, and fruit until well mixed.
Pour the mixture into baking tins and let it rise again.
Keep the batter warm to ensure it rises well the second time.
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.
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Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Nutmeg + raisintop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,377 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Flour
- Forms the structure that holds the cake's shape as it bakes.
- Shortening
- Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and keeps it moist.
- Yeast
- Produces gas during the rises, which lightens the batter.
- Eggs
- Add structure, richness, and moisture to the batter.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps it brown lightly as it bakes.
The step that matters
Keep the batter warm for the second rise. The yeast produces gas only while it is warm, and that gas lifts the batter in the tins. A cool or short second rise leaves the cake dense because there is not enough gas to raise it in the oven.
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, sugar, egg, raisin, milk):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegthe original
- Capersfits less well
- Jalapenofits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, egg, raisin, 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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