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Corn Griddle Cakes

A quick griddle cake made from sour milk, cornmeal, wheat flour, egg, baking soda, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and wheat match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 465 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Corn Griddle Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine sour milk, corn meal, wheat flour, beaten egg, baking soda, and salt. Mix until smooth.

  2. Heat a griddle over medium heat and lightly grease it.

Cook

  1. Pour batter onto the griddle to form cakes.

  2. Cook until bubbles form on the surface, 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. Corn + wheattop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  2. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  3. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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

Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to make the cakes rise and turn tender.
Corn meal
Provides the main body and the grainy texture that defines the cakes.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-based structure so the cakes hold together when flipped.
Beaten egg
Binds the batter and adds richness and structure as it sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk's acid to release gas, lifting the batter and lightening the cakes.

The step that matters

Cook until bubbles form, then flip. Bubbles appearing on the surface show the batter has set enough to be turned. Flipping too early tears the cakes, while waiting until the surface is set gives a steady rise and an even golden brown.

“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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