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Dessert

Batter Cakes

A simple cake made by mixing flour, baking powder, salt, eggs, milk, and butter, then cooking in a skillet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Batter Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt.

  2. In another bowl, beat eggs and add milk and melted butter.

  3. Combine wet and dry ingredients until just mixed.

Cook the cakes

  1. Heat a skillet over medium heat and pour batter to form cakes.

  2. Cook until bubbles form, then flip and cook until golden brown.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Flour
Provides the starch and structure that hold the cakes together as they cook.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the batter set firmly as it cooks.
Milk
Adds moisture and loosens the batter to a pourable consistency.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and helps the cakes brown.
Baking powder
Releases gas that makes the cakes rise and turn light and airy.

The step that matters

Combine wet and dry ingredients until just mixed. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour, which makes the cakes tough and chewy instead of tender. Stop once no dry flour streaks remain.

“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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