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Cornmeal Griddle Cakes

A batter of cornmeal, flour, milk, eggs, and butter cooked on a griddle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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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 ↓

Cornmeal Griddle Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Sift cornmeal gradually into boiling water and boil slowly for 5 minutes.

  2. Beat until smooth.

  3. Add milk and the yolk of the egg gradually.

  4. Mix in the sifted dry ingredients and melted butter.

  5. Beat thoroughly.

Bake

  1. Fold in the stiffly beaten egg white.

  2. Bake immediately.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 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

Cornmeal
Forms the main structure and gives the pancakes a slightly grainy texture.
Flour
Adds structure so the batter holds its shape while cooking.
Egg
The yolk adds richness and the whipped white lightens the batter.
Baking powder
Releases gas during cooking, causing the pancakes to rise.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich flavour.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps the batter reach a pourable consistency.

The step that matters

Bake immediately. Baking powder starts releasing gas as soon as it meets liquid, so the batter loses rising power if it waits after the egg white is folded in.

“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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