Why it works: Corn and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,165 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Corn Meal Mush
Ingredients
Directions
Make the mush
Boil 1 quart of water with 1 teaspoon of salt.
Sift together 1 cup of corn meal and 2 tablespoons of flour.
Gradually stir the corn meal mixture into the boiling water.
Cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly.
If lumpy, beat with a whisk.
Transfer to a double boiler.
Cook for 2 hours.
Serve hot.
Set and fry
Pour into a pan to cool.
Once cooled, cut into ½-inch slices.
Dust with flour.
Brown each side in hot fat.
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.
-
Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,165 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Corn meal
- Forms the thick body of the mush as its starch swells and sets when cooked.
- Flour
- Helps keep the mush smooth and lets the cooled slices brown in the fat.
- Hot fat
- Browns the cooled slices on the outside, adding crisp texture and toasted flavour.
The step that matters
Stirring in the corn meal. Adding the corn meal mixture gradually while stirring keeps it from clumping into lumps as it hits the boiling water. Starch granules need to be separated and stirred as they hydrate and thicken, so lumps are hard to smooth out later.
“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.
More cornmeal mush recipes
You might also like
Corn Fritters203 recipes
Cream of Corn Soup50 recipes
Green Corn Soup46 recipes
Cornmeal Gruel41 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.