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Dessert

Corn Cakes

A sweet cake made with wheat flour, cornmeal, butter, sugar, eggs, and baking powder, baked in a tin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Wheat and milk 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 ↓

Corn Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA sharp oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a sharp oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the meal

  1. Boil 1 pint of milk and sweeten it with sugar.

  2. Pour the milk over the Indian meal and let it soak for 2 to 3 hours.

Make the batter

  1. Mix the baking powder with the flour while dry.

  2. Cream the butter, add the eggs, and gradually mix in the soaked Indian meal.

  3. Make a thin batter using the necessary milk and water.

  4. Sift in the flour while stirring with a wooden spatula until it forms a stiff batter.

Bake

  1. Butter the tins and preheat them.

  2. Pour in the batter about 1½ inches deep in each tin.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Wheat + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

White wheat flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cakes together as they bake.
Sweet indian meal
Adds coarse texture and body; soaking it softens the grains so the batter blends evenly.
Cooking butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the cakes brown at the surface.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and contributes to browning as the cakes bake.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the crumb.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cakes rise and become light.

The step that matters

Adding the flour to form a stiff batter. Stirring in the flour too vigorously can develop gluten and make the cakes tough. Mixing gently until just combined keeps them tender, while the baking powder still lifts them in 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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