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Bread

Tanglewood Corn Bread

A moist cornbread made with cornmeal, flour, molasses, brown sugar, sour milk, boiling water, baking soda, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Molasses and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Tanglewood Corn Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine cornmeal, flour, molasses, brown sugar, sour milk, and boiling water.

  2. Add baking soda and salt, mixing well.

  3. Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.

Bake

  1. Bake for about 30-40 minutes or until golden brown.

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. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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
Provides the main body and the characteristic grainy, corn-forward texture of the bread.
All-purpose flour
Adds gluten-forming structure so the cornbread holds together when sliced.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark sweetness and flavor, and helps the crumb brown.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and promotes browning at the surface.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to leaven the batter and lighten the crumb.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda. Baking soda starts reacting as soon as it meets the acidic liquids, so the batter should go into the dish and into the oven promptly to trap the gas while it is still active.

“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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