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 ↓
Johnny Cake
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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix the sour milk, cornmeal, flour, sugar, and salt.
Add the egg and melted butter to the mixture.
If the milk is very sour, add baking soda and mix well.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.
Bake for about 30–40 minutes, or until golden brown.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,165 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Sour milk
- Its acidity reacts with baking soda to help the cornbread rise and gives a tangy flavour.
- Cornmeal (in the method)
- Forms the main body of the cornbread and gives it its coarse, crumbly texture.
- Egg
- Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the oven.
- Flour
- Adds gluten-based structure so the cornbread holds together better than cornmeal alone.
- Butter
- Adds fat for moistness, tenderness and rich flavour.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in sour milk to produce gas that makes the bread rise.
The step that matters
Adding baking soda only when the milk is very sour. Baking soda needs an acid to react and release gas for lift. Too much baking soda, or using it with milk that is not sour, can leave a soapy, bitter taste and a coarse texture, while too little leaves the cornbread dense.
“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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