Why it works: Butter and milk 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 Bread
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix together the sugar, butter, and eggs until well combined.
Add the sweet milk, baking powder, and corn meal, and stir until smooth.
Gradually add flour until the mixture is quite stiff.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.
Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) 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.
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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,165 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + corntop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Butter and flour 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 structure as they set during baking.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, making the cornbread rise and turn light.
- Corn meal
- Gives the cornbread its characteristic grainy texture and flavor.
- Flour
- Adds structure so the batter becomes stiff enough to hold its shape.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown during baking.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
The step that matters
Gradually add flour until the mixture is quite stiff. Flour adds gluten-forming structure, and too much at once or too little leaves the batter either dense and tough or loose and crumbly. Adding it gradually lets you stop when the batter reaches the stiffness the recipe calls for.
“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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