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Dessert

School Gingerbread

A gingerbread made with flour, butter, ginger, soda, lemon essence, golden syrup, and warm milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

School Gingerbread

Oven, in the book's wordsA very slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a bowl, rub together flour and unsalted butter or margarine until well combined.

  3. Add ground ginger to the flour mixture.

  4. Warm Lyle's Golden Syrup and mix it into the batter along with the essence of lemon.

  5. Dissolve carbonate of soda in a teacup of warm milk and water, then mix it into the batter.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake for about two hours.

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. Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the gingerbread together as it bakes.
Butter or margarine
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavour.
Carbonate of soda
Reacts with the batter to produce gas, helping it rise and lighten.
Lyle's golden syrup
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the crumb stay soft.

The step that matters

Dissolving the carbonate of soda. The soda must be fully dissolved in the warm liquid before mixing, so it reacts evenly throughout the batter. Unevenly distributed soda can leave pockets that are bitter or patchy and cause uneven rising.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, lemon, syrup, milk):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, lemon, syrup, milk. 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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