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Bread

Soft Gingerbread

A moist loaf made with flour, butter, brown sugar, molasses, ginger, spices, and optional lemon peel and plums.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,620 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Soft Gingerbread

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 the batter

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

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

  3. Add the molasses and mix well.

  4. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, ginger, allspice, mace, and cinnamon.

  5. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture.

  6. Incorporate the beaten eggs and the dissolved pearl ash.

  7. If desired, fold in the grated lemon peel and stoned plums.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into greased bread pans.

  2. Bake for about 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick 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. Ginger + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + allspicetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,302 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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 and richness as they set in the oven.
Pearl ash
Dissolved in sour milk, it releases gas that lifts the batter and helps it rise.
All-purpose flour
Provides the starch and gluten network that gives the cake its structure.
Butter
Adds fat and tenderness, and carries flavor through the batter.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness, and color to the gingerbread.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the crumb stay soft.

The step that matters

Adding the pearl ash mixture. Pearl ash must be fully dissolved in the sour milk before it goes in, so it reacts evenly and lifts the batter. Undissolved pockets can cause uneven rising and dark spots.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, molasses, egg, ginger, milk. 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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