Skip to main content
Dessert

Soft Gingerbread

A moist gingerbread cake made with molasses, shortening, sour milk, baking soda, ginger, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Molasses and ginger are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,116 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. 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

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

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix together the molasses, shortening, and sour milk.

  2. Add the baking soda and ginger, then stir until combined.

  3. Gradually add flour until the batter is as stiff as sponge cake.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan and bake for about 30-40 minutes.

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Ginger + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Molasses + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + gingertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,519 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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 dark sweetness, moisture and the characteristic gingerbread flavor.
Shortening
Adds fat, giving the cake a tender, soft crumb.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with baking soda to help the cake rise and stay soft.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Flour
Provides structure, setting the batter into a cake as it bakes.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the batter is as stiff as sponge cake. Adding flour gradually lets you judge the consistency. Too much flour at once or too much overall makes the cake dense and dry, while too little leaves it too loose to hold its structure.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Jalapenofits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, milk, 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.

More soft gingerbread recipes

Cake 4 See all 197 →

You might also like

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