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Breakfast

Southern Pancakes

A batter of eggs, flour, butter, baking powder, sugar, and milk cooked on a hot pan.

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

Southern Pancakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Beat the eggs until smooth.

  2. Melt the butter and mix in the baking powder and sugar.

  3. Add the milk to the butter mixture.

  4. Combine the wet and dry ingredients.

Cook

  1. Heat a frying pan until very hot and grease it.

  2. Pour a spoonful of batter into the pan and spread it evenly.

  3. Cook until brown on both sides.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 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
Bind the batter and add structure as they set during cooking.
Flour
Forms the main structure that holds the pancake together as it cooks.
Butter
Adds fat for richness, tender texture and a golden flavour.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the pancakes rise and become light.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the surface brown in the pan.
Milk
Provides the liquid that hydrates the flour and gives the batter its pourable texture.

The step that matters

Heat the pan until very hot and grease it. A very hot, greased pan sets the batter quickly, so the pancake holds its shape and browns evenly. A cool or ungreased pan lets the batter spread thin and stick, so the pancake tears when turned.

“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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