Name: Steamed Brown Bread
Ingredients: 1 cup white flour; 2 cups Graham flour; 2 cups cornmeal; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1 cup molasses; 3½ cups milk; ¼ teaspoon salt

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 ↓

Steamed Brown Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

In a large bowl, combine white flour, Graham flour, cornmeal, baking soda, molasses, milk, and salt.
Beat the mixture well until smooth.
If using sweet milk, substitute baking powder for baking soda.

Steam and finish

Pour the batter into a greased mold and steam for 4 hours.
After steaming, place the bread in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 15 minutes.
Serve warm with butter.

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.

Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,429 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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: Gives the bread its hearty, coarse texture and nutty flavor.
Cornmeal: Adds body and a grainy texture to the crumb.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas, helping the bread rise.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture, and reacts with the baking soda.
Milk: Hydrates the flours and cornmeal to form a pourable batter.

The step that matters

Steaming for the full time. Steaming gently sets the wet, dense batter into a moist loaf. Cutting the steaming short leaves the centre gummy and under-risen, because the starches and proteins need sustained moist heat to set.

“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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Steamed Brown Bread