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Dessert

Indian Corn Cakes

A batter of Indian meal, wheat flour, milk, salt, yeast, and eggs baked into cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wheat and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Indian Corn Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix the Indian meal and wheat flour in a bowl.

  2. Stir in the warmed milk, salt, and yeast.

  3. Add the beaten eggs and mix until combined.

  4. Let the batter rise until light.

Cook and serve

  1. Preheat a griddle and bake the batter like buckwheat cakes.

  2. Serve hot.

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. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  2. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk 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

Indian meal
Provides the main body and corn flavour of the cakes.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, so the batter rises and becomes light.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the cakes hold together when cooked.
Warmed milk
Hydrates the meal and flour, forming a pourable batter.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein that gives the batter some extra structure.

The step that matters

Let the batter rise until light. Yeast needs time to ferment and release gas; rising too little leaves the cakes dense, while the batter must be fully mixed first so the yeast is evenly distributed.

“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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