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Dessert

Spiced Gingerbread

A sweet, spiced loaf made with sugar, butter, sour milk, molasses, eggs, flour, ginger, cinnamon, lemon rind, lemon juice, and baking soda.

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

Spiced Gingerbread

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Beat the eggs thoroughly.

  2. Dissolve the baking soda in a small quantity of cold water.

  3. Grate the rind from the lemon and extract the juice.

  4. Rub the butter and sugar together.

Mix and bake

  1. Add the eggs, dissolved baking soda, molasses, sour milk, ginger, cinnamon, lemon rind, lemon juice, and flour. Mix well.

  2. Bake in buttered pans.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  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

Eggs
Add structure and richness as they set during baking.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas, helping the cake rise.
Butter
Adds fat and tenderness to the crumb.
Molasses
Adds dark color, moisture and deep sweetness.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds tenderness.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the batter as it bakes.

The step that matters

Dissolve the baking soda in cold water before adding it. Baking soda must be fully dissolved so it spreads evenly through the batter. Clumps can leave bitter, soapy pockets and uneven rising, and the gas it produces needs the acidic molasses and sour milk to work well.

Swap the ginger

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

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

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