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Dessert

Johnny Cake

A cornmeal cake baked with buttermilk, eggs, and shortening.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Combine cornmeal, flour, salt, and sugar in a bowl. Rub the shortening into the mixture with your fingers.

Make the batter

  1. Add the well-beaten eggs and the buttermilk in which the baking soda is dissolved.

  2. Stir all ingredients together and beat with an egg beater for 3 minutes.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a large pan and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 1 hour.

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. Buttermilk + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Cornmeal
Provides the main body and the coarse, grainy texture of the cake.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets in the oven.
Buttermilk
Adds moisture and tang, and reacts with the baking soda to help the cake rise.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic buttermilk to release gas, lifting the batter.
Shortening
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and keeps it moist.

The step that matters

Beating the batter for 3 minutes. Beating after the baking soda is added develops the reaction with the buttermilk, so the batter needs to be mixed promptly and then baked to trap the gas and lift the 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.

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