Name: Composition Cake
Ingredients: 2 cups butter; 3 cups sugar; 5 cups flour; 5 eggs; 1 cup milk; 1 teaspoon dissolved baking soda; 2 tablespoons brandy; 1 pound raisins, seeded and floured; ½ nutmeg, grated

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 ↓

Composition Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

Cream the butter and sugar together.
Beat the eggs and add them to the mixture.
Stir in the grated nutmeg, brandy, and baking soda.
Fold in the floured raisins.

Bake

Line your pans with well-buttered paper.
Pour the mixture into the pans and bake at 350°F (175°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.

Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,377 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,623 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Butter: Creams with the sugar to add richness and a tender crumb.
Sugar: Creams with the butter and adds sweetness and browning.
Eggs: Add structure and binding to hold the batter together while baking.
Flour: Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking soda: Reacts with the batter to help it rise and lighten.
Raisins: Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the cake.

Swap the nutmeg

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

Cinnamonfits better
Nutmegthe original
Clovefits less well
Allspicefits less well

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