Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Common Pancakes
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the pan
Clean the frying pan and rub it with butter or lard.
Heat the pan and wipe it with a clean cloth.
Heat lard or dripping in the frying pan until it boils.
Make and cook the pancakes
In a bowl, mix the eggs, milk, and flour to create a light batter.
Pour a ladleful of batter into the pan and tilt to spread evenly.
Fry until golden brown on one side, then flip carefully.
Once cooked on both sides, place on a hot dish.
Serve
Serve immediately with vinegar, verjuice, or lemon and sugar.
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 + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Flour + vinegartop 27% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,652 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + vinegartop 28% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,949 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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 when cooked.
- Flour
- Provides the starch and structure that hold the thin batter together.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and liquid so the batter spreads thinly and cooks tender.
- Lard or dripping
- Conducts heat and fries the surface, promoting golden browning and preventing sticking.
The step that matters
Heating the fat until it boils. The fat must be hot enough before the batter goes in. If it is too cool, the pancake soaks up grease and sticks, and it will not brown 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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