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Dessert

Molasses Tea Cakes

A sweet cake made with molasses, sugar, boiling water, shortening, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Molasses Tea Cakes

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. In a large bowl, mix together the sugar and molasses.

  2. Add the boiling water and stir until combined.

  3. Incorporate the shortening and mix well.

  4. Finally, add the baking soda and blend until smooth.

  5. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto a baking sheet.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden brown.

  2. Let cool before serving.

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. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 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
Provides dark color, moisture and a rich, slightly bitter sweetness.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown as they bake.
Shortening
Adds fat for a tender texture and moist crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses acid to lift the cakes and darken the crumb.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda last. Baking soda reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas for lift, so the batter should be blended smoothly and baked promptly before that reaction fades.

“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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