Name: Corn Meal Muffins
Ingredients: 1 cup flour; 1 cup sweet milk (scant); 1 cup yellow corn meal; 1 tablespoon butter, melted; 1 cup sugar; 1 teaspoon salt; 2 teaspoons baking powder; 1 egg

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 ↓

Corn Meal Muffins

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

Sift the flour, cornmeal, salt, and baking powder together.
Add the sugar and mix well.
Beat the egg and add the milk to it.
Stir the egg and milk mixture into the dry ingredients.
Add the melted butter and beat well.

Bake

Pour the batter into well-greased muffin pans.
Bake for 30 minutes.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,955 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + corntop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,165 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,345 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, 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

Egg: Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the oven.
Baking powder: Releases gas during baking, helping the muffins rise and become light.
Yellow corn meal: Provides the coarse, grainy texture that defines the muffin crumb.
Flour: Forms the main structure that holds the muffins together as they bake.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Sugar: Sweetens the batter and helps the crust brown during baking.

“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.