In Little House on the Prairie, Laura mentions corncakes that she and her family ate while travelling westward in their covered wagon.
Traditionally, corncakes are a type of cornbread made with cornmeal, flour, baking powder as well as the addition of milk and eggs. While travelling in their wagon, the Ingalls did not have access to fresh milk or eggs, so water would have been used instead to hold them together in cake form.
Caroline likely cooked them in a bake oven, which at the time is a wide, shallow pot with a heavy lid and handle. This would allow fire to be build on all sides as needed, and it would bake the corncakes inside, like a primitive oven. This was a quite common way for pioneers to bake over an open fire.
