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Bread

Salt-rising Bread

A cornmeal bread made with milk, lard, soda, and salt, risen overnight and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Salt-rising Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the sponge

  1. Scald the milk.

  2. Pour the scalded milk over the corn meal, stirring constantly until mixed.

  3. Wrap the bowl in a cloth.

  4. Set the bowl in a warm place to rise overnight.

  5. Combine hot water, salt, sugar, soda, and the cornmeal sponge in a large jar.

  6. Stir the mixture well.

  7. Sift flour into the mixture.

  8. Beat the mixture thoroughly.

Make the dough

  1. Sift about 4 quarts of flour into a bread pan, making a hollow in the center.

  2. Add a small handful of salt and the lard to the hollow.

  3. Set the pan in a warm place to allow the flour to warm up.

  4. When the sponge has risen, pour it into the flour mixture.

  5. Rinse the jar with 2 pints of water.

  6. Add the rinsed water to the mixture.

  7. Mix gradually with your hands for 20 minutes.

Shape and bake

  1. Divide the dough into small loaves.

  2. Shape the loaves.

  3. Place the loaves top side down in a greased bake pan.

  4. Press the loaves with your knuckles.

  5. Cover the pan with a cloth.

  6. Let the loaves rise until even with the top.

  7. Bake in a moderately hot oven at 350°F (175°C) for 1 to 1.25 hours.

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. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  2. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Milk and flour 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

Corn meal
Forms the fermenting sponge and gives the bread its coarse, slightly crumbly texture.
Flour
Builds the main structure of the dough once gluten develops with kneading.
Lard
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and softens the texture.
Sugar
Feeds the fermentation and adds a little sweetness and browning.
Soda
Reacts with acidity in the sponge to help the loaves rise.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture, richness and softness to the dough.

The step that matters

Let the sponge rise fully overnight in a warm place. The sponge is the leavening base; if it is too cold or under-risen, fermentation is weak and the loaves will be dense. Warmth keeps the fermentation active.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, corn, sugar, flour):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, corn, sugar, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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