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Baking

Drop Ginger Cakes

Drop ginger cakes are sweet baked treats made with brown sugar, molasses, butter, boiling water, egg, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Drop Ginger Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine brown sugar, molasses, and butter.

  2. Pour boiling water over the mixture and stir well.

  3. Add the beaten egg, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, and ground cloves.

  4. Mix in the flour until well combined.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto buttered baking sheets.

  2. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden, being careful not to burn them.

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 + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. 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

What each ingredient does

Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the cakes brown.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, moisture, and a dark color to the cakes.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the cakes.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure to the cakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to lighten the cakes and help them rise.
All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that sets the cakes as they bake.

The step that matters

Watching the bake. Molasses and sugar brown quickly at high heat, so the cakes can scorch before they are cooked through. Checking for golden color rather than relying only on time helps prevent burnt bottoms and bitter edges.

Swap the ginger

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, molasses, butter, egg, cinnamon, clove, 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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