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Dessert

Pork Cake

A sweet loaf made from boiled pork, raisins, currants, sugar, molasses, spices, citron, baking soda, and flour.

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

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 ↓

Pork Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pork

  1. Boil the fat pork until soft, then chop it very finely.

  2. Add the boiling water and mix well on the stove.

Make the cake

  1. Stir in the raisins, currants, sugar, molasses, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, citron, baking soda, and flour, then mix thoroughly until combined.

Store

  1. Store in a jar; it will keep for months.

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 + 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. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Fat pork
Provides fat that keeps the cake moist and rich in texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses to lighten the batter and help it rise.
Flour
Builds the structure that holds the cake together as it sets.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the batter.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps browning and tenderness.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, raisin, sugar, molasses, cinnamon, allspice, clove):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, raisin, sugar, molasses, cinnamon, allspice, 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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