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Bread

Milk Bread

Milk Bread is a yeasted bread made with milk, flour, sugar, lard or butter, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Milk 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.

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast and sugar in lukewarm milk.

  2. Add 1½ quarts of sifted flour and beat until smooth.

  3. Cover and let rise in a warm place, free from drafts, for about 1½ hours.

  4. When light, add the melted lard or butter, remaining flour, and salt to form a dough that can be handled.

  5. Knead until smooth and elastic.

  6. Place in a well‑greased bowl, cover, and let rise again until doubled in bulk, about 2 hours.

Shape and bake

  1. Mold into loaves and place in well‑greased bread pans, filling them half full.

  2. Cover and let rise again until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 40 to 50 minutes.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the bread its structure and chew.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, leavening the dough so it rises and becomes airy.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the crumb and helps browning in the crust.
Lard or butter
Tenderizes the crumb and adds richness by coating gluten strands.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds a little sweetness and browning to the crust.

The step that matters

Letting the dough rise until doubled before shaping and baking. Yeast gas must build enough gas bubbles and gluten strength to lift the loaf. Under-proofed dough bakes dense, while over-proofed dough can collapse or lose structure.

“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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