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Bread

Bran Bread

A loaf of bread made with sweet milk, molasses, baking soda, salt, graham flour, and bran.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Bran 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

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

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine sweet milk, molasses, baking soda, and salt.

  2. Stir in graham flour and bran until well mixed.

  3. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.

Bake

  1. Bake for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Molasses + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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 structure of the loaf, with a hearty, nutty texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses acidity to produce gas that lifts the batter as it bakes.
New orleans molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor, and adds acidity that activates the baking soda.
Sweet milk
Hydrates the flour and dissolves the other ingredients to form a pourable batter.
Bran
Adds fiber-rich texture and absorbs liquid, giving the loaf a coarser crumb.

The step that matters

Mixing the batter and baking soda with molasses. Baking soda needs an acid such as molasses to release carbon dioxide. Mixing the batter promptly and moving it to the pan and oven keeps the gas from escaping before the structure sets, so the loaf rises well.

“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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