Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓
Corn Bread
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
In a bowl, stir 1½ cups of sifted cornmeal into 1 cup of boiling sweet milk.
Add 1 teaspoon of salt and 1 tablespoon of butter, mixing well.
Beat 4 egg yolks with 1 tablespoon of granulated sugar and stir into the mixture.
In a separate bowl, beat 4 egg whites with 1 tablespoon of sugar until stiff peaks form.
Gently fold the beaten egg whites and 3 teaspoons of baking powder into the cornmeal mixture.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased baking dish and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 30 minutes.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
- Cornmeal
- Forms the main body of the bread and gives it its characteristic grainy texture.
- Egg whites
- Beaten to stiff peaks, they trap air that lightens the batter and helps it rise.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness, fat and moisture, and help bind the batter.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, helping the cornbread rise in the oven.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and flavor.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Beaten egg whites hold air bubbles that give lift. Stirring them vigorously deflates the foam and makes the bread dense, so fold gently and only until just combined.
“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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