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Dessert

Breakfast Johnny Cake

A cornmeal-based cake made by soaking the mixture overnight and baking it in a preheated oven.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Breakfast Johnny Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the batter

  1. Mix the cornmeal, flour, cornstarch, salt, and enough water (or milk) to wet thoroughly in a bowl.

  2. Cover and let sit overnight.

Finish and bake

  1. In the morning, add the egg, baking soda, brown sugar, and melted butter to the mixture and beat well until combined.

  2. Bake immediately in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C).

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 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 + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Fine yellow cornmeal
Provides the main body and coarse, grainy texture of the cake.
All-purpose flour
Adds structure that helps the cake hold together after baking.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the oven.
Baking soda
Reacts with the batter's acidity to produce gas that lifts the cake.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown in the oven.
Melted butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.

The step that matters

Bake immediately after adding the baking soda. Baking soda starts releasing gas as soon as it meets the batter's acidity and moisture. Waiting lets that gas escape, so the cake may bake up flat and dense.

“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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