Skip to main content
Dessert

Spider Cake

A batter of cornmeal, wheat flour, eggs, milk, butter, and baking soda, baked in a skillet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Spider Cake

Why it works: Wheat and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Spider Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the batter

  1. Mix together the cornmeal, wheat flour, salt, baking soda, and butter.

  2. Add the beaten eggs.

  3. Add 1 cup of sweet milk and the sour milk.

Pour and bake

  1. Butter a skillet with a piece of butter the size of an egg.

  2. Pour in the mixture.

  3. Add the second cup of sweet milk, without stirring.

  4. Bake in a brisk oven at 400°F (200°C).

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Wheat + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

Flour and butter 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

Cornmeal
Provides the main structure and a coarse, grainy texture.
Wheat flour
Adds structure and helps hold the cake together as it sets.
Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set into a firm crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the milk to release gas, helping the cake rise.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and softness to the batter.
Butter
Adds fat for richness, flavor, and browning on the skillet.

The step that matters

Bake in a brisk oven. A hot oven makes the leavening gas expand quickly and sets the batter's structure before it can collapse. A cool oven gives a flat, dense cake.

“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.

You might also like

Wheat MuffinsWheat Muffins48 recipesWhole Wheat MuffinsWhole Wheat Muffins12 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipes