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Salt-raising Bread

A bread made by fermenting a salt and flour batter, then kneading and baking.

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 ↓

Salt-raising Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA steady oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a steady oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the starter

  1. Scald a quart tin cup or earthen milk pitcher.

  2. Fill it one-third full with warm water.

  3. Add salt, brown sugar, and enough coarse flour to make a light batter.

  4. Place the cup in a closed vessel half-filled with moderately hot water.

  5. Maintain an even temperature.

  6. Add a teaspoon of flour once or twice during fermentation.

  7. Wait about five hours until the yeast rises to the top of the cup.

Make the sponge

  1. Sift flour into a pan.

  2. Make a well in the center.

  3. Pour in the yeast.

  4. Stir in warm milk (or milk and water) to form a pulpy mass.

  5. Cover the sponge.

  6. Keep it warm for an hour.

Shape and bake

  1. Knead the mixture into loaves.

  2. Add flour to achieve the right consistency.

  3. Place loaves in greased pans.

  4. Cover and let rise until light.

  5. Bake in a steady oven at 350°F (175°C).

  6. Let steam escape when done.

Store

  1. Wrap in damp towels.

  2. Store in closed earthen jars until needed.

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. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Coarse flour
Feeds the fermentation that produces the yeast for the starter and forms the batter.
Warm milk
Adds moisture and richness to the dough, softening the crumb.
Salt
Controls the rate of fermentation and adds flavor.
Brown sugar
Provides food for the yeast, helping the starter ferment.

The step that matters

Maintaining an even temperature during the starter's fermentation. Yeast activity is sensitive to temperature. Uneven or excessive heat can stall or overwork the fermentation, so the starter may fail to rise properly.

“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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