Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
White Corn Bread
Ingredients
Directions
Scald the cornmeal with hard-boiling water.
Mix in the butter and beaten egg.
Add milk until the mixture is thin enough to pour into the pan.
Ensure the butter layer is about 1 inch thick.
Bake until golden brown.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cornmeal
- Forms the main body of the bread and sets as it bakes.
- Egg
- Binds the batter and adds structure and richness to the crumb.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and helps browning in the pan.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and thins the batter to a pourable consistency.
The step that matters
Scald the cornmeal with hard-boiling water. Pouring boiling water over cornmeal starches and softens the grains, so the bread gets a moister, more tender crumb. Cold or lukewarm water leaves the texture gritty and dry.
“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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