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Dessert

Sugar Ginger Bread

A sweet bread made with brown sugar, flour, powdered ginger, butter, eggs, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Sugar Ginger Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dry mix

  1. Dry and pound the brown sugar, then mix it with the flour and powdered ginger.

  2. Sift the mixture together.

Make the batter

  1. Wash the salt out of the butter and cream it until smooth.

  2. Beat the eggs well and gradually work them into the butter mixture.

  3. Combine the flour mixture with the butter and egg mixture until light and fluffy.

  4. Add the brandy and mix well.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into greased molds and bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + gingertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 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

Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the crust brown during baking.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the batter together as it bakes.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add richness and structure as they set.
Unsalted butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor.
Powdered ginger
Supplies the warm, spicy aroma that defines the bread.

The step that matters

Working the eggs into the butter. Adding the beaten eggs gradually lets them emulsify into the butter. Adding them too quickly can split the mixture, which leads to a coarse, uneven texture in the finished bread.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Gingerthe original

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