Skip to main content
Dessert

Elderberry Blossom Cake

A fried cake made from elderberry blossoms coated in batter and served with cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,341 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Elderberry Blossom Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the milk.

  2. Add enough flour to create a batter similar to that for apple fritters.

  3. Stir in a pinch of salt.

Prepare the blossoms

  1. Carefully pick over the elderberry blossoms to remove leaves and insects.

  2. Dip the bunches of elderberry blossoms into the batter.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat lard in a frying pan and fry the dipped blossoms.

  2. Before turning, cut off the stems with scissors; divide large bunches if necessary.

  3. Once golden, remove from the pan and sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.

  4. Serve hot with cream.

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 + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set and hold its coating while frying.
Flour
Forms the body of the batter that coats the blossoms and crisps when fried.
Milk
Thins the batter to a coating consistency and adds moisture and tenderness.
Lard
Fries the coated blossoms, giving a golden, crisp surface through browning.

The step that matters

Frying the dipped blossoms. The lard must be hot enough so the batter sets and browns quickly; if it is too cool, the coating absorbs excess fat and turns greasy and soggy.

Swap the cinnamon

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

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Cinnamonthe original
  3. Jalapenofits less well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, flour, sugar, cream. 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.

You might also like

Cinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipes