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Dessert

Soft Gingerbread

A moist gingerbread cake made with molasses, brown sugar, butter, sweet milk, baking soda, allspice, ginger, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,620 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 large bowl, mix together the molasses, brown sugar, butter, and sweet milk until well combined.

  2. Add the baking soda, allspice, and ginger, and mix thoroughly.

  3. Gradually add the sifted flour, mixing until smooth.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into shallow baking tins and bake for about 25-30 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. Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  3. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Allspice + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,302 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Molasses
Provides the dark color, rich flavor, and moisture that keep the gingerbread soft.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas that lifts the batter and gives a light crumb.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that sets as the batter bakes.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and carries flavor.

The step that matters

Adding the flour gradually. Mixing flour in slowly and stopping once smooth keeps the batter from being overworked. Overmixing develops gluten, which can make the baked gingerbread tough rather than soft.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, sugar, butter, milk, ginger, flour):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, butter, milk, ginger, 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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