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Dessert

Soft Gingerbread

A moist gingerbread loaf made with butter, molasses, eggs, flour, spices, sweet milk, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Soft Gingerbread

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

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

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, cream the butter and molasses together.

  2. Add the beaten eggs and mix well.

  3. In another bowl, combine the flour, ginger, nutmeg, allspice, cinnamon, and baking powder.

  4. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, alternating with the sweet milk.

  5. Mix until smooth and well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 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 + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 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

Molasses
Provides sweetness, dark color, and moisture and a rich gingerbread flavor.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the crumb set as the cake bakes.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and turns light.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich, soft crumb.

The step that matters

Alternating the dry ingredients with the sweet milk. Adding the dry ingredients in portions alongside the milk keeps the batter emulsified and smooth. Adding everything at once can leave lumps or an uneven, dense crumb.

Swap the ginger

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, molasses, egg, flour, nutmeg, allspice, cinnamon. 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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