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Bread

Nut Bread

A sweet loaf made with sugar, buttermilk, Graham and wheat flour, nuts, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Nut Bread

Why it works: Buttermilk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Nut Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix sugar, egg, melted butter, and salt.

Make the batter

  1. Add buttermilk, Graham flour, wheat flour, and baking soda; mix well.

  2. Fold in the nuts.

  3. Let the mixture rise for 30 minutes.

Bake

  1. Pour into a greased loaf pan and bake for 30 minutes.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sugar + buttermilktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Wheat + nutstop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together57 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Buttermilk
Acid that reacts with baking soda to produce gas, helping the bread rise and turn tender.
Baking soda
Base that reacts with the acidic buttermilk to release carbon dioxide for lift.
Graham flour
Whole-grain flour that adds a coarse, hearty texture and nutty flavor.
Wheat flour
Provides gluten that gives the loaf its structure and crumb.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets during baking.
Butter
Adds fat for moisture, tenderness, and richer flavor in the crumb.

The step that matters

Let the mixture rise for 30 minutes. Buttermilk and baking soda begin producing carbon dioxide as soon as they meet. Resting lets that gas form before baking, but the batter should be baked promptly so the bubbles are not lost and the loaf rises well.

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, butter, buttermilk, flour, wheat):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Walnutfits better
  3. Milletfits better
  4. Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, butter, buttermilk, flour, wheat. 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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