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Bread

Afternoon-tea Bread

A yeast bread with milk, butter, sugar, and egg white, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Afternoon-tea Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Scald the milk and let it cool.

  2. Butter a bowl and add the warm milk.

  3. Melt the butter, then dissolve the sugar, salt, and yeast in it.

  4. Sift in flour until a stiff dough forms that does not stick to the bowl.

  5. Beat the dough well.

  6. Carefully fold in the beaten egg white.

First rise

  1. Cover the bowl with a towel and let the dough rise until it doubles in size, about 1 hour at 70°F (21°C).

  2. Cut down the dough and beat it well.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape into a loaf, rolls, or biscuits.

  2. Allow them to rise until they double in size again.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 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).

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

Yeast
Ferments the dough, producing gas that makes it rise.
Flour
Forms the dough structure that traps gas and sets when baked.
Egg white
Adds structure and lift to the dough when folded in beaten.
Milk
Provides moisture and tenderness and helps browning in the crust.
Butter
Adds fat for a softer crumb and richer flavour.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning.

The step that matters

Carefully fold in the beaten egg white. Folding gently keeps the air in the beaten egg white, which helps the dough rise lightly. Beating or stirring hard would knock out that air and make the bread denser.

“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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