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Dessert

Gingerbread Without Butter

A gingerbread made with candied citrus, spices, treacle, and flour, baked without butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and coriander match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,498 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Gingerbread Without Butter

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the mixture

  1. Cut the candied lemon, orange, and citron into very thin slices.

  2. Mix the sliced candied fruits with ground ginger, coriander seed, and caraway seed.

  3. Stir the mixture into the treacle.

  4. Add enough flour to make a smooth paste.

Bake and store

  1. Pour the mixture into an oven-safe tin.

  2. Bake in a brisk oven at 400 °F (200 °C) for 10 to 15 minutes.

  3. Store in a tin box to keep fresh.

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. Lemon + coriandertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,498 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Ginger + coriandertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Orange + gingertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,833 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Lemon + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Treacle
Provides sweetness, moisture and a dark color, and binds the mixture together.
Flour
Adds structure so the mixture forms a smooth paste that holds its shape when baked.
Candied lemon
Adds bright, sweet-tart citrus flavor and chewy texture through the bake.
Candied orange
Adds sweet citrus flavor and chewy texture through the bake.
Candied citron
Adds sweet, floral citrus flavor and chewy texture through the bake.
Ground ginger
Adds warm, pungent spice aroma that defines the gingerbread flavor.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, ginger, coriander, caraway, flour):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Avocadofits less well
  4. Raisinfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, ginger, coriander, caraway, 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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