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 ↓
Pancakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Beat the eggs well, leaving out half the whites.
Stir the eggs into the milk.
Mix the flour with a little milk, then gradually add the rest.
Add the ginger, brandy, and salt, and stir well.
Cook and serve
Melt butter in a pan, pour in a ladleful of batter, and spread it evenly.
Shake the pan; when one side is done, flip it over.
Once both sides are cooked, drain excess grease and place on a dish.
Before serving, sprinkle with 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.
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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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + gingertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,564 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 add richness and structure to the cooked pancakes.
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the starch and gluten that give the pancakes their body.
- Milk
- Supplies the liquid that hydrates the flour and keeps the batter thin and moist.
- Brandy
- Adds aroma and flavor to the batter.
The step that matters
Adding the flour to the milk. Flour mixed in all at once can clump into lumps that stay in the batter. Mixing it with a little milk first makes a smooth paste, and adding the rest gradually keeps the batter even.
Swap the ginger
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, flour, brandy, butter, sugar):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Clovefits about as well
- Gingerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, flour, brandy, butter, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“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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