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Bread

War Breads

A wartime bread made from stale bread crumbs, milk, eggs, flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Chapel, Inie Gage, Mrs. [from old catalog] · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 27 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

War Breads

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Soak 1 pint of stale bread crumbs in three cups of milk.

  2. Beat the soaked crumbs with two eggs, 1 pint of flour and two heaping teaspoonfuls of baking powder.

  3. Pour four boiling water over 1 cupful of bread crumbs.

  4. Let the mixture stand while the other part is being prepared.

  5. Add one cupful of milk to the crumbs.

  6. Add 1% cupfuls of flour sifted with two teaspoonfuls of baking powder.

  7. Add 2 tablespoonfuls of sugar and 1 teaspoonful of salt.

  8. Add 1 egg last.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake the batter on a hot griddle.

  2. Bake on a hot griddle.

  3. Serve with hot syrup.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

737Calories
28 gProtein
15 gFat
122 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 7 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Chapel, Inie Gage, Mrs. [from old catalog]. 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. See the original page.

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. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as it cooks.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the bread rises and turns light.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets the batter as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Soak up milk to give the batter body and a soft, moist crumb.
Milk
Adds moisture and softens the crumbs into a pourable batter.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the surface brown on the griddle.

The step that matters

Bake on a hot griddle. If the griddle is not hot enough, the batter spreads and absorbs fat without setting, and the cakes turn out heavy. A hot surface sets the outside quickly so the baking powder can lift the batter and the surface can brown.

“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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