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Escalloped Corn

A baked corn dish with cayenne, salt, butter, cream, sugar, and breadcrumb topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Escalloped Corn

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Escalloped Corn

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the corn

  1. Cut the corn from the ears, avoiding the cob.

  2. Use the back of a knife to push out the juice and small kernels.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the corn in an earthen dish.

  2. Add cayenne, salt, butter, cream, and sugar; stir to combine.

  3. Sprinkle fine bread crumbs on top.

  4. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 15 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.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  5. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Corn
Forms the body of the dish and, with its released juice, provides moisture and sweetness.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, helping the dish feel tender and carry flavor as it bakes.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, giving the corn a soft, custard-like texture when baked.
Bread crumbs
Forms a topping that dries and browns in the oven, adding contrast to the soft corn.

The step that matters

Pushing out the corn milk. Scraping the cobs after cutting releases the starchy juice and milky pulp that thickens and sweetens the dish. Skipping this leaves the corn drier and less cohesive.

“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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