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Dessert

Coffee Cake

A moist cake made with molasses, brown sugar, butter, coffee, eggs, spices, flour, and raisins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Coffee 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 the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter, molasses, and brown sugar.

  3. Add the cold coffee and eggs, mixing well.

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

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

  6. Fold in the raisins.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

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

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

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Coffee + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together895 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor to the cake.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the cake brown and stay tender.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the cake a tender crumb and flavor.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses and cream of tartar to produce gas that lifts the cake.
Cream of tartar
Acidic ingredient that works with baking soda to help the cake rise.

The step that matters

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined. Flour forms gluten when mixed with liquid, and overmixing makes the cake tough. Stirring only until combined keeps the crumb tender, while adding the dry ingredients gradually helps the batter blend evenly.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, sugar, butter, coffee, egg, cream, cinnamon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, butter, coffee, egg, cream, cinnamon. 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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