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Turnip Bread

A loaf made from mashed boiled turnips, flour, butter, sugar, salt, and water, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,874 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Turnip 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the dough

  1. Boil the turnips until soft, then mash them thoroughly.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the mashed turnips, flour, salt, sugar, and melted butter.

  3. Gradually add water until a dough forms.

  4. Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth.

Bake

  1. Shape the dough into a loaf and place it in a greased baking pan.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30-40 minutes or 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

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. Turnip + flourtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Turnip + buttertop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,100 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Boiled turnips
Provide moisture and body, giving the dough a soft, tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough structure and holds the loaf together.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and contributes flavor.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth. Kneading develops gluten, which gives the bread its structure and chew. Under-kneading leaves a weak, crumbly loaf, while the flour on the surface keeps the dough from sticking without adding too much to the dough.

Swap the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, butter):

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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