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Bread

Risen Corn Bread

A yeasted corn bread made with Indian meal, wheat flour, milk, eggs, sugar, butter, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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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 ↓

Risen Corn Bread

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 batter

  1. Dissolve half of the Fleischmann’s Yeast Cake in a little warm water.

  2. Add enough milk to make a soft batter with the Indian meal and wheat flour.

  3. Stir in the salt, then add the beaten egg whites and yolks, sugar, and melted butter.

Rise and bake

  1. Set the batter to rise until light.

  2. Bake in large pans or patty pans in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Wheat + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,002 recipes

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

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

Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, lightening the batter so it rises.
Indian meal
Forms the main body of the bread and gives its corn flavor and crumb.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten structure that helps hold the batter together.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, and help the crumb set as it bakes.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and feeds the yeast, and helps the crust brown.
Butter
Adds fat for a softer, more tender crumb and richer flavor.

The step that matters

Set the batter to rise until light. Yeast gas expands the batter, and it needs enough time to aerate it. Underproofed batter bakes dense, while overproofed batter can collapse and turn coarse.

“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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