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Dessert

Apple Johnny Cake

A cornmeal apple cake baked with sliced apples, sugar, milk, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Apple Johnny Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

  1. Mix the cornmeal, cream of tartar, sugar, milk, salt, and baking soda in the order given.

  2. Beat thoroughly and then add the sliced apples, mixing well.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered shallow cake pan.

  2. Bake for 30 minutes in a hot oven at 400 °F (200 °C).

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. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

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

  3. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

White cornmeal
Forms the bulk of the batter and gives the cake its coarse, crumbly texture.
Cream of tartar
Acidic component that reacts with baking soda to help the cake rise.
Baking soda
Alkaline leavener that releases gas with the acid to lift the batter.
Milk
Hydrates the cornmeal and provides moisture for a tender crumb.
Tart apples
Add moisture and a tart flavor that balances the sweetness of the cake.

The step that matters

Mix the cream of tartar and baking soda in the order given. Cream of tartar and baking soda react as soon as they are wet, releasing gas that lifts the batter. Adding them in the stated order and mixing promptly keeps that lift available for the bake.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, milk, cinnamon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, milk, cinnamon. 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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