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Dessert

Ginger Drop Cakes

A sweet cake made with molasses, brown sugar, lard, sour milk, flour, spices, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Ginger Drop Cakes

Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Ginger Drop Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine molasses, brown sugar, lard, and sour milk.

  2. In another bowl, mix flour, cinnamon, baking soda, ginger, and cloves.

  3. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, mixing until well combined.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto baking sheets.

  2. Bake in the preheated oven until golden brown.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness that gives the cakes their flavor.
Lard
Adds fat for a tender crumb and helps the cakes stay soft.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the cakes rise.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the cakes together as they bake.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness, moisture, and browning to the cakes.

The step that matters

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. Adding flour in portions and mixing until just combined keeps the batter smooth and lumps out, while avoiding overmixing that would toughen the cakes. Baking soda needs to be evenly distributed to rise well.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, milk, flour, cinnamon, clove. 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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