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Alabama Corn-crust

A simple cornmeal crust baked until slightly browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Alabama Corn-crust

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.

Prepare

  1. Stir the boiling water into the cornmeal, sugar, and salt, and mix well.

  2. Stir in the beaten egg and spread thin in small biscuit pans.

  3. Smooth with a knife dipped in cold water and score it.

Bake

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until slightly browned, about 10 minutes.

  2. Watch that it does not scorch.

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. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 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

Cornmeal
Forms the main body of the crust as its starches swell in the hot water and set when baked.
Egg
Binds the mixture and adds structure and richness as it sets in the oven.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness and helps the surface brown.

The step that matters

Watch the bake for scorching. The crust is spread thin, so it browns quickly. Sugar speeds browning, so the window between lightly browned and scorched is short and the surface can burn before the centre is fully set.

“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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