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 ↓
Hominy a LA Creme
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Cook hominy until nearly done, adding salt.
Fill a casserole about three-fourths full with hominy.
Finish and serve
For breakfast, cover with milk and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 30 to 60 minutes.
For dinner, add pepper and butter to taste, and allow to simmer in milk or cream until creamy.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together26,984 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Hominy
- Forms the bulk of the dish, with its starchy texture giving body to the finished casserole.
- Milk or cream
- Provides moisture and richness, softening the hominy and creating the creamy texture.
- Butter
- Adds fat and richness, rounding out the flavour of the creamy finish.
The step that matters
Simmering in milk or cream until creamy. Hominy's starch needs liquid and gentle heat to soften and thicken the milk or cream. Boiling hard can scorch the dairy and cause it to separate, so a slow simmer gives a smooth, creamy result.
“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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