Name: Soft Gingerbread
Ingredients: 1 cup sugar; 1 cup butter; 1 cup sour cream; 1 cup New Orleans molasses; 4 cups sifted flour; 1 tablespoon ground ginger; 2 tablespoons baking soda; Grated rind of 1 lemon; 3 eggs, well beaten

Why it works: Ginger and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Soft 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
Add the beaten eggs, sour cream, and molasses to the mixture.
Gradually stir in the sifted flour, baking soda, ground ginger, and lemon rind until well combined.

Bake

Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.
Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center 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.

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.

Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,154 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,225 recipes

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

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 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

Eggs: Bind the batter and add structure as the cake bakes.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour cream and molasses to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Flour: Provides the main structure that sets as the gingerbread bakes.
Butter: Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavour.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture, and gives gingerbread its characteristic flavour.
Sour cream: Adds acidity and moisture, tenderising the crumb and activating the baking soda.

Swap the lemon

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

Raisinfits better
Vanillafits better
Figfits about as well
Lemonthe original

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