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Dessert

Unequalled Buckwheat Cakes

A batter of buckwheat flour, wheat flour, yeast, milk, and water cooked on a griddle into cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Buckwheat and wheat match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 113 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Unequalled Buckwheat Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine buckwheat flour, wheat flour, salt, and yeast.

  2. Add warm milk and warm water to the dry ingredients and mix well.

  3. Let the batter sit until it rises, about 30 minutes.

Cook and serve

  1. Preheat a soapstone griddle or a regular griddle greased lightly with a rag.

  2. Pour ¼ cup of batter for each cake onto the hot griddle.

  3. Cook until the edges look dry.

  4. Flip with a spatula.

  5. Cook the other side until golden brown.

  6. Serve immediately.

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. Buckwheat + wheattop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together113 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Buckwheat + flourtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together660 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Buckwheat + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together328 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Buckwheat flour
Provides the main structure and the earthy, nutty flavour of the cakes.
Yeast
Ferments the batter so it rises and gives the cakes a light, airy texture.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein that helps the cakes hold their shape.
Warm milk
Adds moisture and richness and helps the yeast become active.

The step that matters

Let the batter sit until it rises. Yeast needs time and warmth to ferment; if the batter is not allowed to rise, the cakes will be dense and flat instead of light and airy.

“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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