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Soft Gingerbread (Two-thirds of a cup of butter)
Two-thirds of a cup of butter, two-thirds of a cup of molasses, one cupful sugar, one cupful sour milk, one tablespoonful ginger, four cups flour, two eggs, one teaspoonful of soda, a little salt.
This is a list of ingredients with no method, no pan and no oven — normal for a supper-table cake everyone in the house already knew how to make. The proportions are sound; what follows fills in the parts the original assumes.
- Method, since none is givenCream the butter with the sugar, beat in the eggs and molasses, then add the flour alternately with the sour milk. Dissolve the soda in the sour milk before it goes in so it disperses evenly rather than leaving bitter streaks.
- Sour milkThis means naturally soured raw milk, which modern pasteurised milk will not reproduce — it spoils rather than sours. Use buttermilk, or a cup of milk with a tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar stirred in and left ten minutes.
- Soda and acidOne teaspoon of soda against a cup of sour milk and two-thirds cup of molasses is the whole leavening; there is no baking powder here. Substitute a neutral liquid for the sour milk and you lose most of the acid — the molasses supplies some, but the rise will be poor and leftover soda can taste soapy.
- MolassesUse a light or full-flavour cane molasses. Blackstrap is far more bitter and mineral than this cake wants.
- GingerA tablespoon of ground ginger reads as a lot, and it is: this is a frankly gingery cake, not a lightly spiced one.
- Pan and ovenThe batter suits a 9-by-13 inch pan, greased and floured. The original specifies no oven and no time; in a modern oven, 350F for 30 to 35 minutes, until the centre springs back and a skewer comes out clean.
- CupsTurn-of-the-century cups were close enough to today's 8 fluid ounces that no adjustment is needed. Four cups of flour is roughly 480 to 500 g; measure by scooping and levelling rather than packing, or the cake turns dry.
- Yield and servingAbout 15 squares. Soft gingerbread was eaten warm with butter, whipped cream or applesauce, and it keeps better on the second day than most cakes.
Soft gingerbread earned its name in contrast to the hard, rolled and cut gingerbread of earlier centuries — the kind stamped into shapes and dried until it snapped. By the nineteenth century American kitchens had settled on this softer cake version, leavened with saleratus or soda working against molasses and sour milk, and it was a common household recipe because every ingredient was a pantry staple: butter, molasses, flour, sour milk from the crock, and ground ginger. The recipe's bare ingredient list, with no oven temperature and no timing, reflects a cook judging heat by hand and experience, for whom a formula this familiar needed no explaining.