Name: Soft Gingerbread
Ingredients: one cup butter; 1 cup brown sugar; 1 cup molasses; 1 cup sour cream; 3 1/2 cups flour; 1 teaspoonful baking soda dissolved in hot water; 1 tablespoonful cinnamon; 1 tablespoonful ginger; 3 eggs

Why it works: Cinnamon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Soft Gingerbread

Ingredients

Directions

_Contributed by Miss Mary Lapsley-Pyle, Philadelphia, Pa._
One cup butter, 1 cup brown sugar, 1 cup molasses, 1 cup sour cream, 3½ cups flour, 3 eggs, 1 teaspoonful baking soda dissolved in hot water, 1 tablespoonful cinnamon, 1 tablespoonful ginger.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

850Calories

36 gProtein

19 gFat

132 gCarbs

Counts 8 of 9 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 8 portions

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
Molasses	1 tbsp (20g)	58
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Cinnamon	1 tsp ground (2.6g)	6
Ginger	1 tsp grated fresh (2g)	2
Water	not in our table	0

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

By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.). 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.

Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,380 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,341 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

Smell alikelow

Cooked together30,779 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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 ginger

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

Nutmegfits better
Cardamomfits about as well
Allspicefits about as well
Gingerthe original

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