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Dessert

Indian Meal Wafers

A batter of egg yolks, butter, flour, salt, sweet milk, and cornmeal baked into wafers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wheat and corn 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 ↓

Indian Meal Wafers

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the batter

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs thoroughly.

  2. Add the butter, wheat flour, and salt to the yolks.

  3. Gradually stir in the sweet milk and corn meal until smooth.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into wattle irons and bake.

  2. For rolls, take a portion of the dough, add more lard or butter, sugar, and the beaten egg white (optional).

  3. Set the rolls to rise until light, then bake in a hot oven (400°F / 200°C) for 20 minutes.

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. Wheat + corntop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the batter into a smooth mixture.
Corn meal
Provides the main body and structure of the wafers as it hydrates.
Sweet milk
Hydrates the corn meal and gives the batter its moisture and softness.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavor.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein that helps hold the batter together.

The step that matters

Gradually stir in the sweet milk and corn meal until smooth. Adding the liquid and dry ingredients gradually prevents lumps, so the corn meal hydrates evenly and the batter bakes with a uniform texture.

“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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