Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon 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 ↓
Ginger Cake
Ingredients
Directions
Cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the eggs, ginger, cinnamon, sour milk, and baking soda.
Mix in enough flour to achieve a stiff batter.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,380 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked 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
What each ingredient does
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the cake as its proteins hydrate and set.
- Butter
- Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and help give the cake its structure.
- Sour milk
- Provides acidity that reacts with baking soda to lighten the batter.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in sour milk to produce gas that makes the cake rise.
- Sugar
- Creamed with butter to trap air and add sweetness and tender browning.
The step that matters
Mix in enough flour to achieve a stiff batter. The amount of flour sets the batter's stiffness and structure. Too little leaves a loose batter that spreads and sinks, while stirring too vigorously once flour is in develops gluten and makes the cake tough.
Swap the ginger
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, cinnamon, milk, flour):
- Nutmegfits better
- Cardamomfits better
- Allspicefits about as well
- Gingerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, cinnamon, milk, 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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