Name: German Christmas Gingerbread
Yield: 1 tube cake
Ingredients: 1 cup butter, softened; 2 cups packed brown sugar; 3 eggs; 2/3 cup honey; 1/4 cup orange liqueur; 1 cup sour cream; 1/2 cup orange juice; 1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour; 1 cup whole wheat flour; 4 teaspoons baking powder; 2 teaspoons ground ginger; 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon; 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg; 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves; 1 cup raisins; 1 cup blanched slivered almonds

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

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.

Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Honey + wheattop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together346 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,373 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Swap the orange

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

Vanillafits better
Figfits better
Raisinfits better
Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, honey, cream, flour, wheat. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Yogurt	170g plain Greek	100
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Honey	1 tbsp (21g)	64
Orange	1 medium (131g)	62
Grape	1/2 cup (76g)	62
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Nutmeg	1 tsp ground (2.2g)	12
Cloves	1 tsp ground (2g)	7
Almond	1 almond (1.2g)	7
Cinnamon	1 tsp ground (2.6g)	6
Ginger	1 tsp grated fresh (2g)	2

German Christmas Gingerbread