Skip to main content
Dessert

Gingerbread

A gingerbread cookie dough made with molasses, sour milk, eggs, baking soda, cream of tartar, brown sugar, butter, and ginger.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
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 ↓

Gingerbread

Oven, in the book's wordsA rather quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a rather quick oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix together the molasses, sour milk, eggs, baking soda, cream of tartar, brown sugar, butter, and ginger.

  3. Stir until the mixture is stiff enough to roll out.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and cut it into desired shapes.

  2. Place the cut pieces in a large dripping pan and bake until golden.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, moisture and a dark color to the dough.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the cookies rise and stay tender.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure as the cookies set in the oven.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to release gas, helping the cookies rise.
Cream of tartar
Adds acidity that works with the baking soda to leaven and lighten the dough.
Butter
Provides fat for tenderness and flavor and helps the cookies brown.

The step that matters

Stir until the mixture is stiff enough to roll out. Stirring develops gluten, which toughens cookies, while too little mixing leaves the dough too soft to cut cleanly. Stop once it holds together and is firm enough to roll.

Swap the ginger

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

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

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

You might also like

Ginger CookiesGinger Cookies213 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesGinger CakeGinger Cake93 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipes