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Indian Griddle-cakes

A batter of cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, eggs, and milk cooked on a hot griddle to make cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Indian Griddle-cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Sift and mix together cornmeal, flour, brown sugar, baking powder, and salt.

  2. Add beaten eggs and milk, and beat until smooth.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat a griddle over high heat and pour batter to form cakes.

  2. Cook until browned on both sides.

  3. Serve with syrup.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 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

Cornmeal
Forms the bulk of the cakes, giving them a grainy, sturdy structure.
All-purpose flour
Adds gluten-based structure so the cakes hold together when flipped.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set during cooking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cakes rise and become light.
Milk
Hydrates the dry ingredients and adds moisture and tenderness to the batter.

The step that matters

Cook until browned on both sides. Cooking over high heat sets the outside quickly and browns it through the Maillard reaction, which gives flavor. Flipping only once the edges look set and the underside is golden keeps the cakes from tearing or staying raw in the middle.

“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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