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Bread

Baked Brown Bread

A moist bread made with sour milk, molasses, brown sugar, raisins, and graham flour, baked at 300°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and flour 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 ↓

Baked Brown Bread

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).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix sour milk, molasses, brown sugar, egg, and raisins.

  2. Dust the mixture heavily with white flour.

  3. Add cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.

  4. Gradually stir in graham flour until well combined.

  5. Pour the batter into a greased baking pan.

Bake

  1. Bake for 45 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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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 main structure and a hearty, coarse texture to the loaf.
Sour milk
Adds moisture and acidity that reacts with the baking soda to help the bread rise.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and a deep brown color and flavor.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the crumb stay soft.

The step that matters

Gradually stir in the graham flour until just combined. Overmixing develops gluten and bran structure that can make the bread dense and tough. Stirring only until the flour is incorporated keeps the crumb tender while the leavening still works.

“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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