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Dessert

Flannel Cakes

Flannel Cakes are a batter-based griddle cake made with milk, butter, eggs, yeast, salt, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Flannel Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Melt the butter in the hot milk.

  2. Add the cold milk, beaten egg yolks, salt, yeast, and enough flour to make a stiff batter.

  3. Set the batter in a warm place to rise for several hours or overnight.

Cook

  1. Before baking, fold in the beaten egg whites.

  2. Fry the batter like regular griddle cakes.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Yeast
Ferments the batter so it rises and becomes light and airy.
Eggs
Yolks enrich the batter, and whipped whites add lightness and lift.
Flour
Provides the starch and gluten structure that holds the risen batter together.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the batter.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and moistens the batter, adding softness and browning.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Beaten whites trap air that gives lift. Stirring them in vigorously deflates the bubbles, so fold gently and cook soon after to keep the cakes light.

“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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