johnnycake

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john·ny·cake

(jŏn′ē-kāk′)

n. New England & Upper Midwest

Cornmeal bread usually shaped into a flat cake and baked or fried on a griddle. Also called regionally ashcake, batter bread, battercake, corn cake, cornpone, hoecake, journey cake, pone, Shawnee cake.

[Perhaps alteration (influenced by the name Johnny + and cake) of earlier jonakin; perhaps akin to English dialectal (Lancashire) jannock, flat loaf of oaten bread, perhaps from Jan, variant of the name John.]

Our Living Language When the Native Americans showed the Pilgrims how to cook with maize, they must have taught them to make johnnycake, a dense cornmeal bread whose thick batter is shaped into a flat cake and baked or fried on a griddle. Johnnycake, also called journey cake and Shawnee cake, is a New England specialty, especially in Rhode Island, where johnnycakes are often made of white Indian corn called flint corn. Outside New England the name johnnycake is best known in the Upper Midwest, but the food itself is most popular in the South and South Midland states, where it is known as ashcake, batter bread, battercake, corn cake, cornpone, or hoecake.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

john•ny•cake

(ˈdʒɒn iˌkeɪk)

n. Northern U.S.

a flat cake or bread made with cornmeal, usu. cooked on a griddle.

[1730–40, Amer.; probably by folk etym. from earlier jonakin, of obscure orig.]

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Noun

johnnycake - cornbread usually cooked pancake-style on a griddle (chiefly New England)

johnny cake, journey cake

cornbread - bread made primarily of cornmeal

hoecake - thin usually unleavened johnnycake made of cornmeal; originally baked on the blade of a hoe over an open fire (southern)

Shawnee cake - form of johnnycake

New England - a region of northeastern United States comprising Maine and New Hampshire and Vermont and Massachusetts and Rhode Island and Connecticut

References in periodicals archive ?

Washington Trust donated peanut butter to the following local food banks: North Kingstown Food Pantry; the Jonnycake Centers of Peace Dale and Westerly; the Wood River Food Pantry; The Bread of Life Food Pantry; the Comprehensive Community Action Program; the Providence In-Town Churches Association; the Rhode Island Community Food Bank; the Pawcatuck Neighborhood Center; and the West Bay Community Action Program.