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Dessert

Thanksgiving Cake

A cake made with flour, eggs, sugar, almonds, butter, cocoa nut, baking powder, preserved lemon peel, and lemon extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Thanksgiving 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.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make and bake the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, eggs, sugar, beaten almonds, butter, grated cocoa nut, baking powder, preserved lemon peel, and lemon extract until well combined.

  2. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  3. Bake for 2 hours or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Decorate and serve

  1. Once cool, decorate the cake with icing and fancy bonbons.

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. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set during baking.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as the batter sets.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown and stay moist.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and lightens.
Beaten almonds
Add nutty flavor and body to the batter.

The step that matters

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean. The batter is dense and rich, so the cake can look set on top while the center is still wet. Testing the center with a toothpick confirms the eggs and starches have set throughout, avoiding a gummy middle.

Swap the cocoa

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, egg, sugar, almond, butter, lemon):

  1. Pistachiofits better
  2. Cashew nutfits better
  3. Hazelnutfits better
  4. Cocoathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, egg, sugar, almond, butter, lemon. 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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