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To Make Whole-meal Bread and Porridge

A recipe for whole-meal bread made by mixing yeast, water, salt, and flour, then baking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Richmond, I. L · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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To Make Whole-meal Bread and Porridge

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sponge

  1. Put 7 lb. of whole-meal into a pan.

  2. Mix 3 oz. German yeast with 1 quart warm water.

  3. Make a hole in the meal, pour in the yeast, and stir it round with a spoon until it makes a thick batter.

  4. Throw dry meal over the batter and set it before the fire for an hour, when it will have risen and burst the covering of dry meal.

Make and bake the bread

  1. Add more warm water and two teaspoonfuls of salt until it forms a nice light dough when kneaded.

  2. Work the dough thoroughly.

  3. Cover the dough with a cloth and let it stand for another hour before the fire.

  4. Make the dough up into loaves.

  5. Bake the loaves for about an hour.

By Richmond, I. L. 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

What each ingredient does

Whole-meal flour (in the method)
Provides the bulk of the dough and the structure that holds the loaf together.
German yeast (in the method)
Ferments the batter so gas is produced, causing the dough to rise.
Warm water
Hydrates the flour and activates the yeast, forming a workable dough.

The step that matters

Letting the sponge rise before adding the rest. The batter must rise fully and burst its dry flour crust before kneading. Yeast needs time and warmth to produce gas, and adding more liquid or salt too early can slow fermentation and leave the loaf 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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