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Bread

Buttermilk Corn Bread

A baked loaf made from cornmeal, flour, lard, molasses, buttermilk, eggs, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and buttermilk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Buttermilk Corn Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the batter

  1. Scald 1 pound of cornmeal with 1 pint of boiling water.

  2. Add the lard and dissolve the baking soda in a little water.

  3. Thin the scalded cornmeal with the buttermilk.

  4. Add the eggs and flour, mixing to form a slack dough like a tea biscuit mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Shape the dough into loaves and place in pans.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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 + buttermilktop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Molasses + buttermilktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Buttermilk + eggtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,986 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

White cornmeal
Provides the main body and corn flavor of the bread.
Lard
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich, moist crumb.
White flour
Adds gluten-forming structure so the loaves hold their shape.
Buttermilk
Adds moisture and acidity, which reacts with the baking soda.
Eggs
Bind the dough and set during baking to give structure.
Baking soda
Reacts with the buttermilk's acid to produce gas that lifts the loaves.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda. Baking soda must be fully dissolved so it reacts evenly with the buttermilk's acid. Clumps leave bitter spots and uneven rising, and the leavening needs to start before the loaves go into the oven.

“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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