Name: Bakers' Ginger Snaps
Ingredients: 1 quart New Orleans molasses; 2 ½ cups brown sugar; 2 cups lard, well packed; 2 tablespoons baking soda; 1 tablespoon ground cloves; 2 tablespoons ground ginger; Flour, as needed

Why it works: Clove and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Bakers' Ginger Snaps

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.

Make the dough

Mix the molasses, brown sugar, lard, baking soda, cloves, and ginger together until well combined.
Knead in flour until the dough is very hard, about 30 minutes, or until it cracks.

Shape and bake

Roll the dough very thin and cut into pieces the size of a silver dollar.
Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until done.
Let the cookies cool, then store them in a stone jar.

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.

Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,038 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Molasses + clovetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,483 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,116 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses: Adds moisture, sweetness, and dark flavor, and helps the cookies stay chewy.
Lard: Provides fat that tenderizes the dough and carries the spice flavors.
Baking soda: Reacts with the molasses's acidity to help the cookies rise and brown.
Ground ginger: Gives the cookies their characteristic spicy, warm aroma.
Brown sugar: Adds sweetness and moisture, and promotes browning and a softer texture.
Flour: Provides the structure that holds the dough together as it is kneaded and baked.

The step that matters

Knead in flour until the dough is very hard. Enough flour must be worked in to give the dough structure and keep it from spreading too much in the oven. Kneading until it cracks shows the dough is stiff enough to roll thin and hold its shape while baking.

Swap the clove

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

Cinnamonfits better
Cardamomfits about as well
Allspicefits about as well
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, ginger, 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.

Ginger Cookies213 recipes

Molasses Cookies96 recipes

Ginger Cake93 recipes

Molasses Cake90 recipes

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Bakers' Ginger Snaps