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 Fritters
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine the corn, sweet milk, eggs, flour, butter, pepper, and salt. Mix thoroughly.
Fry and serve
Heat a frying pan and add butter to coat the bottom.
Drop tablespoonfuls of the mixture into the hot pan.
Cook until nicely browned, then flip and brown the other side.
Serve hot.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,324 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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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).
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
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and help the fritters hold their shape when cooked.
- All-purpose flour
- Thickens the batter so it holds together rather than running in the pan.
- Sweet milk
- Adds moisture and loosens the batter to a drop-able consistency.
- Corn
- Provides the main body, sweetness and texture of the fritters.
- Butter
- Adds richness and helps the outside brown in the pan.
The step that matters
Cook until nicely browned, then flip. Cooking over steady heat until the first side sets lets the batter firm up, so the fritter holds together when turned and browns evenly.
“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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