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Dessert

Ginger Cookies

A simple ginger cookie dough made with molasses, butter or lard, ginger, baking soda, boiling water, and egg, baked until firm.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Ginger Cookies

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 ↓

Ginger Cookies

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 dough

  1. Dissolve the baking soda in boiling water.

  2. In a bowl, mix molasses, butter or lard, ginger, and the dissolved baking soda.

  3. Add the egg and mix until very soft.

Shape and bake

  1. Chill the dough if necessary, then roll out and cut into shapes.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until firm.

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + gingertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,152 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Molasses + buttertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Ginger + eggtop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,337 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and dark colour, and its acidity activates the baking soda.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses acid to release gas, giving the cookies lift and a softer texture.
Butter or lard
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich mouthfeel in the baked cookies.
Egg
Binds the dough and helps give the baked cookies structure.
Ginger
Provides the warm, spicy aroma that defines the cookies.

The step that matters

Dissolve the baking soda fully in boiling water. Baking soda reacts with the acid in molasses to release carbon dioxide. If it is fully dissolved and mixed in evenly, the lift is uniform. Undissolved clumps can leave soapy, bitter, or crumbly spots.

Swap the ginger

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

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

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

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