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Dessert

Fruit Gingerbread

A baked gingerbread cake with butter, molasses, eggs, flour, spices, and dried fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Fruit Gingerbread

Why it works: Cinnamon and clove 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 Gingerbread

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Melt the butter in the boiling water.

  2. Add the molasses and beaten egg, mixing well.

  3. Sift in the flour, baking soda, and spices.

  4. Fold in the floured fruit and candied peel.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a buttered pan.

  2. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for 40 to 50 minutes, or 25 to 30 minutes for individual portions.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 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

Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps give the crumb a soft, moist texture.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the gingerbread together as it bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses's acidity to produce gas, helping the cake rise and lighten.
Molasses
Adds dark sweetness, moisture, and the characteristic deep gingerbread flavor and color.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness to the crumb.
Currants
Add chewy pockets of sweetness and moisture throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Fold in the floured fruit and candied peel. Overmixing once the flour is added develops gluten and toughens the crumb. Fold gently, just until the fruit is evenly distributed and no dry flour remains.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, molasses, egg, flour, ginger, cinnamon, clove. 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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