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Bread

Compressed Yeast Bread

A yeast bread made with compressed yeast, flour, water, and salt, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Compressed Yeast Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sponge

  1. Dissolve the yeast in 2 cups of lukewarm water.

  2. Stir in enough flour to make a thick batter.

  3. Cover the bowl with a thick cloth and let it rise in a warm place for 30 minutes until foamy.

Make the dough

  1. Stir in the salt dissolved in a little warm water.

  2. Add the remaining flour and enough warm water to make a stiff dough.

  3. Knead the dough for 5 to 10 minutes.

Shape and bake

  1. Divide the dough into loaves, knead each loaf again, and place them in buttered baking tins.

  2. Cover with a thick cloth and let rise until doubled in size.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) 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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the bread its structure and chew.
Compressed yeast
Produces carbon dioxide gas that makes the dough rise and become airy.
Warm water
Hydrates the flour so gluten can form and activates the yeast.

The step that matters

Letting the dough rise until doubled. Yeast gas must be trapped by a well-developed gluten network. Under-proofed loaves stay dense, while over-proofed dough can collapse in the oven. Warmth speeds fermentation, so watching the dough's size matters more than the clock.

“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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