Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Yeast Breads
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
Warm the flour just before mixing.
Heat the milk or water until lukewarm, then cool it slightly.
Dissolve the yeast in the lukewarm liquid with sugar.
Stir in the melted butter or lard.
Add the flour gradually, mixing until a dough forms.
Knead and rise
Knead the dough until smooth and elastic.
Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size.
Shape the dough into a loaf and place it in a greased pan.
Let it rise again until it has doubled in size.
Bake
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C) and bake for 30-35 minutes.
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.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- Bread flour
- Provides the gluten network that gives the bread its structure and chew.
- Yeast
- Produces carbon dioxide gas as it feeds, making the dough rise and become light.
- Milk or water
- Hydrates the flour so gluten can form and the dough can be kneaded.
- Butter or lard
- Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and softens the texture.
- Sugar
- Feeds the yeast and helps the crust brown during baking.
The step that matters
Kneading the dough until smooth and elastic. Kneading aligns and stretches gluten strands so the dough can trap the gas from the yeast. Under-kneaded dough rises poorly and bakes dense.
“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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