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Sour Milk Griddle Cakes

A griddle cake made with sour milk, flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking soda, eggs, and cooked on a hot griddle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Sour Milk Griddle Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour, cornmeal, sugar, and baking soda.

  2. Add the sour milk and eggs, then beat well.

Cook the pancakes

  1. Heat a griddle until it is hissing hot.

  2. Grease the griddle with a piece of salt pork on the end of a fork.

  3. Drop a tablespoon of batter onto the hot griddle.

  4. When bubbles form on the surface, flip the cake.

  5. Cook until both sides are golden brown and serve on a hot plate.

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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that holds the pancake together as it sets.
Cornmeal
Adds a slightly grainy texture and toasty flavor to the pancakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in sour milk to produce gas that makes the pancakes rise.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds tang and tenderness.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the batter bind and set on the griddle.

The step that matters

Heat the griddle until it is hissing hot. A properly hot surface sets the outside of the batter quickly, so the pancake forms a browned crust and does not spread or stick. A cool griddle makes pale, greasy, flat cakes.

“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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