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Dessert

Plum Cake

A fruit cake made with raisins, currants, citron, and spices, baked at 400°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and flour 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 ↓

Plum Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Mix the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine the batter, raisins, sweet milk, and beaten eggs.

  2. Add the dissolved saleratus, ground mace or nutmeg, ground allspice, damiana, and brandy.

  3. Stir in enough flour to create a batter that can be stirred easily with a spoon.

  4. Beat the mixture well until light and fluffy.

Add fruit and bake

  1. Fold in the currants, which should be picked, washed, and dried, along with the citron cut into slips.

  2. Pour the batter into a prepared baking pan and bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until done.

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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Mace + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Raisin + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  4. Allspice + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,302 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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 richness as they set in the oven.
Flour
Forms the batter's main structure as its starches set during baking.
Baking soda
Releases gas in the batter, helping it rise and turn light.
Raisins
Add moisture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor that carries through the baked cake.

The step that matters

Dissolve the saleratus fully before adding it. Baking soda must be evenly dispersed to rise evenly. Dissolving it in hot water spreads it through the batter, so pockets of unmixed powder do not leave dense or bitter spots.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, milk, egg, allspice, brandy, flour):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, milk, egg, allspice, brandy, flour. 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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