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Dessert

Gingerbread Nuts

A sweet biscuit shaped like a walnut made from flour, butter, treacle, ginger, allspice, soda, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Charles Elme Francatelli · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 10 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 ↓

Gingerbread Nuts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dough

  1. Gather the ingredients: one pound flour, half a pint treacle, two ounces butter, half an ounce ground ginger, pinch allspice, teaspoon carbonate of soda, pinch salt.

  2. Mix all the ingredients into a firm, well-kneaded stiff paste.

  3. Divide the dough into about twenty-four parts.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll each part into a shape like a walnut.

  2. Place the shaped dough on greased baking tins, spacing them two inches apart.

  3. Bake the gingerbread nuts in a rather brisk oven for about fifteen minutes.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

564Calories
13 gProtein
13 gFat
97 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Allspice1 tsp ground (1.9g)5
Ginger1 tsp grated fresh (2g)2
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Charles Elme Francatelli. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. See the original page.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + allspicetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,325 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the stiff paste together as it bakes.
Treacle
Adds moisture, sweetness and a deep brown colour to the nuts.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the texture and carries the flavour.
Ground ginger
Gives the nuts their characteristic spicy flavour.
Carbonate of soda (in the method)
Reacts to lift and open the dough as the nuts bake.

The step that matters

Spacing the shaped dough on the tins. The dough spreads as it bakes, so leaving two inches between nuts keeps them from fusing and lets each one set with an even shape and crisp edges.

Swap the ginger

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, allspice. 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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