Why it works: Rice and corn match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 933 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Rice Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine the cold boiled rice, flour, egg, corn starch, and salt.
Add enough sour milk or buttermilk to make a smooth batter.
Mix well and then add the baking soda and melted butter.
Bake
Bake immediately.
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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Rice + corntop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together933 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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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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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 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
- Cold boiled rice
- Adds body and a tender, chewy texture to the cakes.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cakes together.
- Egg
- Binds the batter and helps set the cakes as they bake.
- Sour milk or buttermilk
- Supplies moisture and acidity that react with the baking soda.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the milk to produce gas that lifts the batter.
The step that matters
Bake immediately. Baking soda starts releasing gas as soon as it meets the acidic milk. Waiting lets that gas escape, so the cakes may bake up flat 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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