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Dessert

Corn Meal Puffs

A baked cornmeal cake made with milk, sugar, nutmeg, eggs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Corn Meal Puffs

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. In a large pot, bring 1 quart of milk to a boil.

  2. Stir in 8 tablespoons of Indian meal, 4 tablespoons of powdered sugar, and 1 teaspoon of nutmeg, then boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly to prevent sticking.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

  4. Beat 6 eggs until light and fluffy, then mix into the cooled mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Grease teacups with butter and pour in the mixture, filling them nearly full.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

  3. Serve with lemon sauce.

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

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

  2. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Nutmeg + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Nutmeg + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Nutmeg and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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
Beaten eggs add structure and lift, helping the cakes puff and set as they bake.
Indian meal
Cornmeal thickens the cooked milk mixture and gives the cakes their body and texture.
Milk
Boiling milk cooks the cornmeal into a thick base and adds moisture to the batter.
Powdered sugar
Dissolves easily into the hot mixture, adding sweetness and a tender crumb.

The step that matters

Beating the eggs until light and fluffy. Whipping air into the eggs gives the batter its rise; if the eggs are under-beaten or deflated when folded in, the cakes will bake up dense and flat.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, egg, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Parsleyfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, egg, 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.

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