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Dessert

Virginia Batter-cake

A cake made from boiled rice, cornmeal, milk, butter, egg, and salt.

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 ↓

Virginia Batter-cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rice

  1. Boil the rice the day before and drain it.

  2. While the rice is warm, stir in the butter.

Make and bake the batter

  1. The next morning, mix the remaining ingredients together.

  2. Stir in the cup of rice and pour the mixture into 2 greased pans.

  3. Bake immediately for 1 hour.

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. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Boiled rice
Adds body and a soft, tender crumb to the batter.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender texture.
Cornmeal
Gives the cake its grainy texture and structure as it sets.
Egg
Binds the batter and helps it set during baking.
Milk
Provides liquid that hydrates the cornmeal and rice.

The step that matters

Bake immediately after mixing. Once the batter is combined, its leavening and setting begin, so delaying the oven can weaken the rise and texture. Baking straight away keeps the batter's structure intact.

“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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