Why it works: Sorghum and ginger work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 31 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Ginger Cookies
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.
Prepare
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the dough
In a bowl, mix together the sorghum molasses, sugar, sour cream, and egg.
Add the baking soda and lard, then mix until well combined.
Stir in ginger to taste.
Bake and finish
Drop spoonfuls of dough onto a baking sheet.
Bake for 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned.
Let cool and top with boiled icing.
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.
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Sorghum + gingertop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together31 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,225 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,116 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Sorghum + molassestop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together61 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
- Sorghum molasses
- Provides sweetness, dark color, and moisture that keeps the cookies soft.
- Egg
- Binds the dough and adds structure as the cookies set.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic sour cream to make the cookies rise and spread.
- Sour cream
- Adds acidity and moisture, tenderizing the texture and activating the baking soda.
- Lard
- Adds fat for tenderness and a rich texture.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the dough and helps the cookies brown at the edges.
The step that matters
Add the baking soda and lard, then mix until well combined. Baking soda must be evenly distributed through the acidic sour cream mixture, or some cookies will rise unevenly and taste bitter or soapy in spots.
Swap the ginger
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sorghum, molasses, sugar, cream, egg):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Gingerthe original
- Allspicefits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against sorghum, molasses, sugar, cream, egg. 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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