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Dessert

Soft Ginger Bread

A moist ginger bread made with eggs, flour, sugar, butter, buttermilk, molasses, ginger, cloves, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Soft Ginger Bread

Why it works: Ginger and clove 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 ↓

Soft Ginger Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

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

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.

  2. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  3. In a separate bowl, combine the buttermilk and baking soda.

  4. Stir the buttermilk mixture into the creamed mixture.

  5. Gradually add the flour, ginger, cloves, and cinnamon, mixing until smooth.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into sheets or gem pans.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Flour + buttermilktop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + buttermilktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Buttermilk + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Add structure and richness, binding the batter as they set in the oven.
Flour
Forms the structure of the batter as its proteins set during baking.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the bread and helps it brown during baking.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic buttermilk and molasses to give the bread lift.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark colour, and a deep sweet, slightly bitter flavour.

The step that matters

Stirring in the flour and spices. Mixing flour too vigorously develops gluten, which can make the bread tough. Mix only until the batter is smooth so the crumb stays soft.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Clovethe original

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