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Boston Corn Bread

A steamed and baked corn bread made with sweet milk, sour milk, molasses, wheat flour, corn meal, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wheat and corn match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 465 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Boston Corn Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine sweet milk, sour milk, molasses, wheat flour, corn meal, and baking soda. Mix until well combined.

Steam and brown

  1. Pour the mixture into a steamer and steam for 3 hours.

  2. After steaming, transfer to a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) and brown for a few 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.

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. Wheat + corntop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  2. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Corn meal
Provides the main structure and the characteristic coarse, grainy crumb of the bread.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with baking soda to produce gas, helping the bread rise.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to release carbon dioxide for rising.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and a deep color and flavor to the bread.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein that gives the bread some binding and chew alongside the cornmeal.

The step that matters

Steaming for 3 hours. Steam keeps the batter moist while the baking soda and sour milk react to lift the bread. Water must be topped up and the steamer kept at a steady simmer, or the bread can turn dry or dense.

“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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