Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
117 Corn Pone
Ingredients
Directions
The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.
Prepare the batter
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, mix corn meal, flour, sugar or molasses, and salt.
Dissolve baking soda in boiling water and pour it into sour milk.
Combine the sour milk mixture with the dry ingredients.
Add the beaten eggs and mix thoroughly.
Bake
Fill buttered tins to 1.5 inches deep and bake for 30 minutes.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,165 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour and butter 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
- Corn meal
- Forms the bulk of the bread and gives it its coarse, crumbly texture.
- Sour milk
- Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the batter rises and turns tender.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the sour milk to produce gas that lightens the batter.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the crumb.
- Flour
- Adds structure so the pone holds its shape alongside the corn meal.
The step that matters
Dissolve the baking soda fully before adding the sour milk. Baking soda only leavens when it meets acid. Dissolving it in boiling water and mixing it into the sour milk spreads it evenly, so the batter rises uniformly rather than in pockets.
“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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