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Dessert

Drop Ginger Cakes

Drop Ginger Cakes are small, sweet cakes made with molasses, ginger, and flour, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Drop Ginger Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine molasses and boiling water.

  2. Add the egg, brown sugar, and shortening; mix well.

  3. Stir in baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and salt.

  4. Gradually add flour, mixing until smooth.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto a greased baking sheet.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 10-12 minutes or 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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color and a rich, moist texture to the cakes.
Egg
Binds the batter and gives the cakes structure as they set in the oven.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown and stay moist.
Shortening
Adds fat for tenderness and a soft crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas, helping the cakes rise.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets the cakes as they bake.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour, mixing until smooth. Adding flour in portions and mixing just until smooth keeps gluten development controlled, so the cakes stay tender rather than tough, while avoiding lumps that bake unevenly.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, egg, sugar, cinnamon, flour. 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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