Skip to main content
Bread

Delicate Corn-rolls

A light, baked roll made with cornmeal, wheat flour, milk, eggs, butter, and leavening.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and wheat 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 ↓

Delicate Corn-rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the mush

  1. Scald 1 pint of milk in a double boiler.

  2. Add butter, salt, and cornmeal mixed smooth with a little cold milk.

  3. Stir and cook until thick like mush.

Make the batter

  1. Stir in the cold milk mixed with beaten egg yolks.

  2. Add flour sifted with cream of tartar.

  3. Dissolve baking soda in 2 tablespoons of hot milk and add it.

  4. Finally, fold in beaten egg whites.

Bake

  1. Bake in gem pans at 400°F (200°C) for 15 to 20 minutes.

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. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 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
Yolks enrich the batter and whites, folded in last, lighten it and help it rise and set.
Wheat flour
Provides the gluten structure that holds the rolls together as they bake.
Cornmeal
Thickens into mush that gives the rolls their corn flavor and a tender, slightly grainy texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a softer crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid from cream of tartar to release gas that makes the rolls rise.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and cornmeal and adds moisture and richness to the batter.

The step that matters

Fold in beaten egg whites last. Whipped whites hold air that lifts the batter. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring hard deflates it and the rolls bake up dense.

“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.

You might also like

Wheat BreadWheat Bread65 recipesWhole Wheat BreadWhole Wheat Bread55 recipesBarley Wheat BreadBarley Wheat Bread6 recipesCornbreadCornbread345 recipes