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Bread

Graham Bread

A loaf made with graham flour, white flour, molasses, sour milk, baking soda, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk 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 ↓

Graham 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

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

  3. In another bowl, combine the molasses and sour milk.

Mix and bake

  1. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until just combined.

  2. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.

  3. Bake for about 45‑50 minutes or until a toothpick 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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + milktop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Flour and milk 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 coarse, nutty structure and body that gives graham bread its character.
White flour
Adds gluten for structure so the loaf holds its shape alongside the heavier graham flour.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture and a deep color to the crumb and crust.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with baking soda to produce gas that lifts the loaf.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to leaven the bread.

The step that matters

Stir the wet and dry ingredients until just combined. Overmixing develops gluten and knocks out the carbon dioxide from the baking soda reaction, producing a dense, tough loaf. Stop once no dry flour streaks remain.

“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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