Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Graham Griddle Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Combine sour milk or buttermilk with baking soda until it bubbles.
Add the beaten egg and stir in the graham flour to form a batter.
Cook and serve
Cook on a griddle until golden brown on both sides.
Serve with maple syrup.
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 + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
- Sour milk or buttermilk
- Acidity reacts with baking soda to produce gas that lightens the batter.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in sour milk or buttermilk, producing bubbles that make the cakes rise.
- Egg
- Binds the batter and adds structure and richness to the cakes.
- Graham flour
- Forms the body of the batter and gives the cakes their nutty, coarse texture.
The step that matters
Combining sour milk or buttermilk with baking soda. The soda must react with the acid while the batter is fresh. Once the bubbling fades and the batter sits too long, less gas is left to lift the cakes, so they cook up flatter and denser.
“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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