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Griddle Cakes

A quick batter of flour, salt, baking soda, sour milk, butter, and sugar cooked on a griddle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Griddle Cakes

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 ↓

Griddle Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Sift the flour, salt, and baking soda together.

  2. Slowly add the milk and beat until smooth.

Cook

  1. Add the melted butter and fry on a slightly greased hot griddle.

  2. If desired, add a well-beaten egg at the end, using a little more flour.

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.

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.

  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. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the batter together as it cooks.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk or buttermilk to produce gas that lifts the cakes.
Sour milk or buttermilk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tang.
Melted butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the cakes brown on the griddle.
Egg (in the method)
Adds structure and richness when included, binding the batter.

The step that matters

Slowly add the milk and beat until smooth. Adding liquid gradually while beating prevents lumps of dry flour and gives an even batter. Because the baking soda reacts with the acidic milk, the batter should be cooked soon after mixing so the gas bubbles that lift the cakes are not lost.

“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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