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Bread

Brown Bread

A quick bread made with graham, rye, and cornmeal, sweetened with molasses and baked in a loaf pan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Brown Bread

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 ↓

Brown 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.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, combine graham flour, rye flour, cornmeal, sour milk, water, and molasses.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in a little warm water and add it to the mixture. Mix until well combined.

Bake

  1. Grease four one-pound baking powder boxes and fill them with the batter.

  2. Cover the boxes with lids and bake for 35 minutes.

  3. Remove the lids and bake for an additional 10 minutes until done.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + ryetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,320 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Rye + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together918 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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

Graham flour
Provides the bulk and nutty, hearty structure of the loaf.
Rye flour
Adds moisture-holding starch and a dense, tender crumb.
Cornmeal
Contributes coarse texture and body to the crumb.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to make the bread rise.
Baking soda
Produces carbon dioxide with the acidic sour milk, leavening the batter.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture that keeps the bread soft.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda and mixing it in. Baking soda needs an acid to react, and the reaction starts once it meets the sour milk. Mixing it thoroughly spreads the gas-producing reaction evenly so the loaf rises uniformly rather than in pockets or uneven patches.

“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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