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Baking

Buckwheat Cakes

Buckwheat Cakes are batter-based cakes made with buckwheat flour, yeast, salt, cornmeal, molasses, and warm water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Buckwheat and flour work together. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 660 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Buckwheat Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine buckwheat flour, yeast, salt, cornmeal, and molasses.

  2. Add warm water gradually to create a thin batter and beat well.

  3. Set the batter in a warm place to rise.

Keep the sponge

  1. If the batter is sour in the morning, stir in a small amount of baking soda dissolved in hot water.

  2. Each night, reserve a cupful of the batter to use as a sponge for the next day.

  3. Add the usual quantity of flour and mix well each night.

Cook

  1. Cook the cakes in a hot skillet, making them generous in size.

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. Buckwheat + flourtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together660 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Buckwheat + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together199 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Buckwheat flour
Forms the bulk of the batter and gives the cakes their earthy, nutty flavour.
Yeast
Ferments the batter so it rises and becomes light and airy.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour, and helps the batter brown in the skillet.
Baking soda (in the method)
Neutralises sourness that develops in the fermented batter, sweetening its taste.

The step that matters

Checking a sour batter. As the sponge ferments it becomes acidic, which can make the cakes taste sour. A small amount of baking soda neutralises the acid, but too much leaves a soapy taste and harsh flavour, so use only a small quantity.

Swap the buckwheat

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, molasses):

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Buckwheatthe original
  4. Allspicefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, molasses. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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