Name: Steamed Indian Bread
Ingredients: 3 cups sweet milk; 3 cups buttermilk; 3 cups cornmeal; 2 cups all-purpose flour; 1 teaspoon salt; 2 teaspoons baking soda

Why it works: Buttermilk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Steamed Indian Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

In a large bowl, combine sweet milk, buttermilk, cornmeal, all-purpose flour, salt, and baking soda. Mix until well combined.

Steam

Pour the mixture into a buttered pan.
Steam for 3 hours.

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.

Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,721 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + buttermilktop 41% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together9 recipes

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

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

Cornmeal: Provides the bulk and coarse texture of the bread.
All-purpose flour: Adds structure so the bread holds together after steaming.
Buttermilk: Adds moisture and tang, and reacts with the baking soda.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic buttermilk to lighten the batter.
Sweet milk: Adds moisture and softness to the batter.

“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.