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Dessert

Sponge Gingerbread

A gingerbread cake made with sour milk, molasses, butter, sugar, egg, baking soda, ginger, flour, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Sponge Gingerbread

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sponge Gingerbread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

  1. Warm the butter, molasses, and ginger together in a saucepan.

  2. Add the sour milk, flour, egg, and salt to the mixture.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in 1 tablespoon of warm water and add it to the batter.

  4. Mix until well combined and pour into shallow pans.

Bake

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick comes out clean.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the gingerbread.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to lift the batter and tenderize the crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the sour milk to produce gas that makes the sponge rise.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the sponge together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the crumb and gives a rich flavor.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness.

The step that matters

Adding the dissolved baking soda. Baking soda reacts with the acid in the sour milk as soon as it is mixed in, releasing gas. Once it is stirred into the batter, mix only until combined and get the batter into the pans promptly, so the gas is trapped and the sponge rises well rather than falling flat.

Swap the ginger

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

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

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