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 Muffins
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Beat the eggs until light.
Add the milk and mix well.
Make the batter
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking soda, and cream of tartar.
Combine the dry ingredients with the egg and milk mixture, stirring well.
Pour the batter into buttered muffin pans.
Bake
Bake for 20 minutes at 400°F (200°C).
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 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
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add richness and structure as they set in the oven.
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the main structure of the muffin as its proteins set during baking.
- Cornmeal
- Gives the muffins their characteristic grainy texture and corn flavor.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to release gas, helping the muffins rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Acts as an acid that works with baking soda to produce lift and a tender crumb.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and hydrates the flour and cornmeal to form the batter.
The step that matters
Stir the dry and wet ingredients just until combined. Once the batter is mixed, the baking soda and cream of tartar begin reacting, so the rise depends on getting the batter into the pans and oven promptly. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour, which can make the muffins tough and 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.
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