Originally Journey-cake. See quot. 1848, 1849.

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1775.  Rice … is … only fit for puddings, and to put in soops, or to make the wafer-like bread called journey-cakes in Carolina.—B. Romans, ‘Florida,’ p. 125. (N.E.D.)

2

1793.  

          Some talk of Hoe-cake, fair Virginia’s pride,
Rich Johnny-cake this mouth has often try’d;
Both please me well, their virtues much the same;
Alike their fabric as allied their fame.
Joel Barlow, ‘The Hasty-Pudding,’ p. 8 (1815).    

3

1823.  To the lovers of Jonny-cake, and to the sons of swate Ireland, this must be cheering news.—Mass. Spy, Oct. 29.

4

1824.  

        And all at Washington now resident,
From shoe-blacks quite up to the President,
As well the leaders as the led,
Would lack e’en Johnny-cake for bread.
‘New England Farmer’s Boy’: New Year’s Address.    

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1832.  The fire is made for tea, and the fresh journey cake baked before the fire.—Watson, ‘Historic Tales of New York,’ p. 65.

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1834.  

        A johnnie cake,—[a] sonsie fellow,
That swam in butter warm and yellow.
Vermont Free Press, Oct. 4.    

7

1836.  The real name is Journey cake; that is, cake made in haste for a journey. Johnny cake! We might as well call it Tommy or Pelatiah cake!—Phila. Public Ledger, May 21.

8

1840.  America will shrink back to the primeval simplicity of Johny-cakes and sour-krout.—Daily Pennant, St. Louis, April 22.

9

1840.  

        Old Connecticut, to frogs once fatal,
Is the State I call my natal;
Which most of other States surpasses
In pumpkins—johnny-cakes—molasses.
Entry in a hotel register: J. S. Buckingham, ‘The Eastern and Western States of America,’ ii. 162.    

10

1847.  Then came the fine meal Indian Johnny-cake, mixed with cream, eggs, and sugar, and forming, when rightly made, perhaps the most delectable esculent of the bread kind, that ever gratified an epicure’s palate.—D. P. Thompson, ‘Locke Amsden,’ p. 22.

11

1847.  In the morning, a buckeye backlog and hickory forestick resting on stone andirons, with a Johnny-cake on a clean ash board, set before it to bake.—Dr. D. Drake, ‘Pioneer Life in Kentucky,’ p. 107 (Cincinn., 1870).

12

1847.  Father purchased a piece of “johnny-cake,” as large as his two hands, for which he paid one and sixpence, or twenty-five cents.—Id., p. 12.

13

1848.  Corn-meal, pounded in a wooden mortar, or ground in a handmill of steel, supplied the place of flour, and all the preparation of wheat. The dough, properly prepared, was spread upon a piece of shaved clap-board from three to four inches wide, and from fifteen to twenty inches long, and baked upon the hearth. When both sides were perfectly done, it was called “journey-cake,” or Johnny-cake. A journey-cake board was an indispensable implement of frontier cooking. Johnny-cake and pone were the only varieties of bread used among the early frontier settlements for breakfast and dinner. At supper, milk and mush were the standard dish. When milk was not plenty, the lack was supplied by the substantial dish of hommony, or pounded corn thoroughly boiled.—Monette, ‘History of the Mississippi Valley,’ ii. 8 (N.Y.).

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1848.  

        Sure there ’ll be a new creation.
Sure there won’t be no starvation.
    Spirit-aiding; heart up-moving;
    Life-reviving; health-improving.
        New ideal;
        Super-real
    Indian Johnny Cake!
Knick. Mag., xxxi. 225 (March).    

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1849.  Constituents of Johnny Cake. Three teacupfuls of corn meal; one of wheat flour; two of milk; one of cream; one or two eggs; one teaspoonful of salæratus dissolved in hot water, and half a teaspoonful of salt. Girls, hurry up breakfast.—Frontier Guardian, July 25.

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1853.  [They are] like the young man in Nauvoo, who sat down to breakfast from a Johnny cake alone.—Brigham Young, Dec. 5: ‘Journal of Discourses,’ i. 337.

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1856.  Do you eat johnnycake? ’cause if you don’t I ’ll cut some wheat bread.—Whitcher, ‘The Widow Bedott Papers,’ No. 7.

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