Name: Ginger Cakes
Ingredients: 1 pint butter or lard; 1 tablespoon baking soda; 1 pint buttermilk; 2 tablespoons ground ginger; 1 quart New Orleans molasses; Flour to make stiff dough

Why it works: Buttermilk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Ginger Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

Heat the molasses and buttermilk in a large pan until boiling.
Add the baking soda and ginger to the pan.
Stir in enough flour to make a stiff dough, then add the butter or lard.
Once the mixture is cool, mold it with flour and cut into cakes.

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.

Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,721 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Buttermilk + molassestop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together526 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ginger + molassestop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,116 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Ginger + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,564 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

Swap the ginger

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

Cinnamonfits better
Jalapenofits better
Nutmegfits better
Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, buttermilk, molasses, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.