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Bread

Well Tested Graham Bread

A quick bread made with white bread sponge, graham flour, baking soda, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Well Tested Graham 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 dough

  1. In a large bowl, mix the white bread sponge, warm water, baking soda, salt, melted butter, and sugar until well combined.

  2. Gradually add Graham flour until the mixture is too thick to stir with a spoon.

Shape and bake

  1. Divide the dough into two small bread pans, filling them about halfway.

  2. Allow the dough to rise until the pans are even full.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Bread + flourtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,383 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

White bread sponge
Provides a fermented starter that gives the loaf its rise and open crumb.
Graham flour
Forms the bulk of the dough, supplying structure and a nutty, coarse texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sponge to release gas, adding extra lift.
Melted butter
Adds fat for a softer crumb and richer flavor.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds mild sweetness and browning in the crust.

The step that matters

Allow the dough to rise until the pans are even full. Under-proofed dough bakes dense, while over-proofed dough can collapse. Watching the dough's volume rather than the clock helps it rise to the right height before baking.

“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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