Why it works: Flour and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,429 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Brown Bread
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix flour, cornmeal, molasses, salt, and baking soda.
Thin the mixture with cold water until it resembles buckwheat cake batter.
Steam and serve
Pour the batter into a pan, filling it halfway.
Cover the pan tightly and steam for 2.5 hours or until fully cooked.
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.
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Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together10,429 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Flour
- Provides the main structure as the batter sets during steaming.
- Cornmeal
- Adds body and a coarse, grainy texture to the finished bread.
- New orleans molasses
- Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the bread.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the molasses to lighten the batter and help it rise.
The step that matters
Filling the pan halfway. The batter rises as it steams, so filling the pan only halfway leaves room for expansion and keeps the bread from overflowing or becoming 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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