Hoe Cake
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the batter
Pour boiling water over cornmeal until well moistened.
Let the mixture stand until cool, about 1 hour.
Cook the cakes
Grease a griddle with lard and heat it.
Form the mixture into ½ inch thick cakes and cook on the griddle.
Brown both sides well until a firm brown crust forms.
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
What each ingredient does
- Cornmeal
- Forms the body of the cake and absorbs the boiling water to become a workable mixture.
- Boiling water
- Hydrates the cornmeal and softens its starch so the mixture can be shaped.
- Lard
- Greases the griddle and adds fat that helps the cakes brown richly.
The step that matters
Browning both sides well. A firm brown crust forms through browning reactions on the surface. Cooking too gently or flipping too early can leave the cakes pale, soft, or likely to break apart.
“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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