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 Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine grated sweet corn, milk, drawn butter, salt, black pepper, and egg.
Fry and serve
Drop the mixture by the tablespoon into hot butter in a skillet.
Fry for 10 to 20 minutes 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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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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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Grated sweet corn
- Provides the main body and sweet flavour of the cakes.
- Egg
- Binds the corn and milk so the cakes hold together while frying.
- Milk
- Adds moisture so the mixture spreads and cooks through.
- Drawn butter
- Adds richness and helps the cakes brown in the skillet.
The step that matters
Frying the cakes. The skillet needs to be hot before the mixture goes in, so the outside sets and browns quickly. Frying for the full time until golden brown ensures the centre cooks through.
“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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