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Dessert

Rye Cakes

Rye Cakes are a batter made with rye flour, Indian meal, wheat flour, cold water or milk, salt, molasses, yeast, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Rye and wheat match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 404 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Rye Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix rye flour, Indian meal, and wheat flour in a bowl.

  2. Add cold water or milk to create a batter.

  3. Stir in salt, molasses, and enough yeast to make it rise.

  4. Just before baking, mix in the beaten egg.

Bake and serve

  1. Grease cake pans and pour in the batter.

  2. Bake until golden brown and serve hot.

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. Rye + wheattop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together404 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  3. Rye + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,320 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Rye + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together918 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rye flour
Provides the base structure and a distinct, earthy flavour to the batter.
Indian meal
Adds coarse texture and body to the batter.
Wheat flour
Supplies gluten-forming protein that gives the cakes structure.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the batter rise before and during baking.
Egg
Adds richness and helps bind the batter and set it as it bakes.
Molasses
Contributes sweetness, moisture, and browning during baking.

The step that matters

Adding the beaten egg just before baking. Yeast gas is trapped by the batter's structure, so the batter should be baked promptly after the egg goes in. Waiting too long lets the rise weaken before the cakes reach the oven.

“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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