Name: Apple and Peach Cake
Ingredients: 3 cups dried apples; 2 cups molasses; 1 cup sugar; 1 cup raisins; 1 cup thick sour cream; 2 eggs; 1 teaspoon baking soda; Cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves to taste; Flour to make a stiff batter

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Apple and Peach 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.

Soak the dried apples overnight.
In the morning, chop the apples finely and cook them slowly in the molasses for 1 hour.
Once cooled, mix in the sugar, raisins, beaten eggs, and sour cream with baking soda.
Add flour to achieve a stiff batter.
Bake in a moderate oven 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.

Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,917 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,390 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,598 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,377 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

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

Swap the apple

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

Vanillafits better
Figfits better
Orangefits about as well
Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, raisin, cream, egg, cinnamon, nutmeg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.