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Rice Johnny Cakes

A pancake-like cake made with soft-boiled rice, rice flour, milk, eggs, and wheat flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and wheat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Rice Johnny Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine the soft-boiled rice with water or milk, then add the rice flour and mix well to form a batter.

  2. In another bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, baking soda, and wheat flour.

  3. Gradually add Indian meal until the batter reaches pancake consistency.

Cook and serve

  1. Preheat a buttered pan over medium heat.

  2. Pour the batter into the pan and cook until golden brown on both sides.

  3. Serve warm with butter or milk.

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. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

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

  2. Rice + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together423 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the pan.
Baking soda
Reacts with the batter to lift it and help the cakes rise.
Rice flour
Gives the cakes a tender, slightly crisp texture.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-based structure so the cakes hold their shape.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness and helps the cakes brown.

The step that matters

Cook until golden brown on both sides. The pan must be preheated over medium heat so the batter sets and browns evenly. Too hot and the outside burns before the centre cooks; too cool and the cakes steam, turn pale, and stay soggy.

“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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