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Bread

Malt Bread

A yeast-leavened bread made with corn flour, malt extract, sea salt, lard, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,165 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Malt Bread

Ingredients

Directions

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

Mix the dough

  1. Mix 7 cups of water with 2.5 lbs of corn flour until combined.

  2. Add 1 lb of malt extract and 1.5 lbs of coarse sea salt.

  3. Incorporate 1 lb of lard when the dough is at least half mixed.

  4. Work the dough thoroughly and let the mixer run for 10 more minutes.

Rise and shape

  1. Place the dough in a trough to rise, allowing little space at first.

  2. After about 3 hours, check if the dough is ready by pressing it; it should break around the pressed area.

  3. Let it rise for another 30 minutes before molding into loaves.

Bake

  1. Allow for a light proof in the tins and bake in a moderate oven (350°F) with steam.

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. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Corn + malttop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Flour + malttop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together260 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 flour
Adds body and a distinct flavor and texture to the dough.
Malt extract
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown during baking.
Lard
Adds fat, giving the crumb tenderness and a softer bite.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become airy.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the bread its structure.

The step that matters

Checking the dough before shaping. Judging readiness by pressing the dough matters because under-proofed dough will not hold its shape and over-proofed dough collapses. The dough should show a clear, slow-springing response before it is molded.

“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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