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Bread

Corn Pone

A simple cornmeal cake baked with flour, egg, molasses, salt, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,165 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Corn Pone

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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix corn meal, flour, salt, and baking soda.

  2. In another bowl, beat the egg and add molasses.

  3. Combine the wet and dry ingredients until just mixed.

  4. Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.

Bake

  1. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden brown.

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. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Corn + molassestop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together644 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Corn + eggtop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,484 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Corn meal
Forms the bulk of the batter and gives the pone its grainy, sturdy texture.
Flour
Adds structure so the batter holds together after baking.
Egg
Binds the batter and helps set the crumb as it bakes.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and deep color to the crust.
Baking soda
Reacts with the batter to produce gas that helps it rise.

The step that matters

Combine the wet and dry ingredients until just mixed. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour and toughens the pone, so stop once no dry streaks remain and the batter is still lumpy.

“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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