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 ↓
Fine Pancakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, beat the egg well.
Add the flour and mix together.
Pour in enough milk to create a very liquid batter and add a pinch of salt.
Cook and fill
Heat a smooth frying pan with a low edge and grease it with a little melted butter.
When the pan is hot, pour in just enough batter to cover the bottom.
As soon as the batter sets, quickly turn it over.
Fill the pancakes with jam, jelly, or a mixture of cinnamon and sugar.
For a special treat, fill with a delicately-flavored soft custard, known as 'à la Celestin.'
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.
-
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
-
Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
-
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 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
- Egg
- Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the pan.
- Flour
- Provides the starch that gives the pancake its body and structure.
- Milk
- Thins the batter so it spreads thinly and cooks evenly in the pan.
- Melted butter
- Greases the pan so the pancake releases cleanly and browns lightly.
The step that matters
Pour just enough batter to cover the bottom. A thin layer of very liquid batter cooks through quickly and evenly. Too much batter makes a thick, doughy pancake that is hard to turn and may stay raw inside.
Swap the cinnamon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, flour, milk, butter):
- Nutmegfits about as well
- Cinnamonthe original
- Capersfits less well
- Parsleyfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, flour, milk, butter. 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.
More pancakes recipes
You might also like
Rice Gruel28 recipes
Peptoned Milk Gruel9 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.