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Boston Brown Bread, No. 1

A dense, sweet bread made with graham flour, buttermilk, molasses, raisins, and leavened with baking powder and soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Boston Brown Bread, No. 1

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix the graham flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.

  3. Stir in the buttermilk and baking molasses until well combined.

  4. Fold in the raisins if using.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into 1 lb baking powder tins.

  2. Bake for 1 hour.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + buttermilktop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Buttermilk + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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 the hearty, nutty structure of the loaf.
Buttermilk
Its acidity reacts with the leavening to lift the batter and adds tenderness.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic buttermilk to produce gas that makes the bread rise.
Baking molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and the dark color and rich flavor of the bread.
Raisins
Add pockets of sweetness and chewy texture throughout the loaf.

The step that matters

Pour the batter into 1 lb baking powder tins.. The batter is thick and loose enough to rise quickly once leavened, so it should be filled into the tins promptly and evenly, leaving room to rise, so the loaf bakes through without cracking or sinking.

“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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