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Dessert

Johnny Cake

A sweet, spiced cornmeal cake baked at 400°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Buttermilk and flour 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 ↓

Johnny Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the molasses and sugar.

  2. Add the buttermilk and melted butter, then stir well.

  3. In another bowl, combine the cornmeal, flour, baking soda, salt, and allspice.

  4. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until smooth.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking dish and bake until golden brown.

  2. Serve warm.

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. Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sugar + buttermilktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the oven.
Baking soda
Reacts with the buttermilk's acidity to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Buttermilk
Adds moisture and acidity that tenderizes the crumb and activates the baking soda.
Cornmeal
Provides the coarse, grainy body that defines the cake's texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, deep color, and moisture that helps browning.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches flavor and keeps the crumb tender.

The step that matters

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture. Adding dry ingredients slowly and stirring only until smooth keeps the batter from being overmixed. Overmixing develops gluten from the flour, which can make the cake tough and dense.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, molasses, sugar, buttermilk, butter, flour):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Jalapenofits about as well
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, molasses, sugar, buttermilk, butter, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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