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German Pancake

A fluffy, oven-baked pancake made with flour, eggs, milk, and lemon, topped with powdered sugar and lemon garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

German Pancake

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. Sift flour into a bowl and add salt.

  2. Crack in the whole eggs and the yolk, reserving the white.

  3. Pour in the milk, cold water, powdered sugar, and melted butter; mix thoroughly for 5 minutes.

  4. Strain the batter through a fine sieve into another bowl and let it rest.

  5. Beat the reserved egg white to stiff peaks, then mix in lemon juice and cinnamon.

  6. Gently fold the egg white mixture into the batter.

Bake and serve

  1. Heat a lightly buttered pan until it begins to smoke, then pour in the batter.

  2. Cook on the stovetop for 1 minute, then transfer to a 350°F (175°C) oven and bake for 20 minutes.

  3. Remove from the oven, sprinkle with powdered sugar, and bake until golden on top.

  4. Slide onto a hot serving dish with a folded napkin, garnish with lemon quarters, and serve hot.

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. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Flour
Forms the starch structure that sets the pancake as it bakes.
Eggs
Provide structure and lift, with the whipped white helping the batter puff in the oven.
Milk
Adds moisture and tenderness and helps the batter brown.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor and helps the pan release and brown the edges.

The step that matters

Heating the pan until it begins to smoke, then pouring in the batter. A very hot, buttered pan starts the batter setting and rising immediately at the edges. A cool pan lets the batter spread and steam without puffing, so the pancake comes out flat.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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