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Dessert

Fruit Snaps

A sweet cookie made with molasses, spices, sugar, baking soda, eggs, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon 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 ↓

Fruit Snaps

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 the dough

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

  2. In a large bowl, mix together the baking soda, sugar, ginger, molasses, cloves, cinnamon, allspice, and eggs until well combined.

  3. Gradually add flour until the dough is soft but can be rolled out.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and cut into desired shapes.

  2. Place on a baking sheet and bake for about 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned.

  3. Allow to cool before storing in an airtight container.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure as the snaps set in the oven.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep sweetness, and a dark color to the snaps.
Sugar
Sweetens the dough and helps the snaps brown while baking.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses's acidity to help the snaps rise and spread lightly.
Flour
Provides the body that lets the dough be rolled out and hold its shape.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the dough is soft but can be rolled out. Too much flour makes the dough stiff and dry, producing tough snaps, while too little makes it sticky and hard to cut. Adding it gradually lets you stop at the right consistency.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, molasses, clove, cinnamon, allspice, egg, 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.

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