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Bread

Portsmouth Indian Bread

A steamed bread made from rye flour, cornmeal, milk or water, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Rye and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,320 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Portsmouth Indian Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Mix the rye flour and cornmeal together in a bowl.

  2. Wet the mixture with milk or water until it forms a moderate batter.

  3. Add the molasses and stir until combined.

Steam

  1. Pour the batter into a mold or tin kettle.

  2. Place the mold in a pot with water, ensuring the water reaches two-thirds up the mold.

  3. Steam the mixture for the entire day and let it sit overnight.

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. Rye + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,320 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Rye + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together918 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Rye + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together804 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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 bulk of the bread and gives it a coarse, crumbly texture.
Rye flour
Adds structure and binds the cornmeal so the batter holds together.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and a dark color to the finished bread.
Milk or water
Hydrates the flours so they form a spreadable batter that steams through.

The step that matters

Keeping the water level at two-thirds up the mold. Steam, not boiling water, must cook the batter evenly. If water rises over the mold or boils dry, the bread can cook unevenly or get waterlogged, so the pot must be checked during the long steam.

“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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