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Griddle Cakes and Maple Syrup

A cornmeal-based griddle cake made with milk, eggs, sugar, baking powder, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Griddle Cakes and Maple Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix cornmeal, milk, and sugar until smooth.

  2. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  3. In another bowl, combine egg yolks, baking powder, and salt.

  4. Fold the egg yolk mixture into the cornmeal mixture.

  5. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

Cook

  1. Heat a griddle over medium heat and grease with butter or oil.

  2. Pour batter onto the griddle and 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. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Cornmeal
Forms the main body of the cakes and gives them their grainy texture.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the batter, while whipped whites lighten it and help it rise.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, making the cakes rise and become tender.
Milk
Hydrates the cornmeal and adds moisture to the batter.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown on the griddle.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the beaten egg whites. Whisked egg whites hold air that makes the cakes light. Stirring or deflating them with hard mixing knocks out that air, leaving dense, flat griddle 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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