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Dessert

Gingerbread

A spiced sweet loaf made with flour, ginger, molasses, and eggs, baked at 400°F.

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

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 ↓

Gingerbread

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Sift together flour, salt, baking soda, and spices.

  2. Cream together the sugar and shortening.

Mix the batter

  1. Add the molasses and stir in part of the milk and part of the flour until all is added.

  2. Add the beaten eggs and mix well.

  3. Pour into a greased and floured pan.

Bake

  1. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 30 minutes.

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.

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.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Cinnamon and sugar 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
Provides the structure that sets the crumb as the batter bakes.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the crumb.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture, with a deep flavor.
Shortening
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and carries flavor.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to lift and lighten the cake.
Sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps brown the crust in the oven.

The step that matters

Adding the eggs and mixing. Beaten eggs must be fully incorporated so the batter emulsifies evenly. Overmixing after the flour is in can develop gluten and toughen the crumb, so mix only until smooth.

Swap the ginger

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

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

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