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BRbAD

A yeast bread made with milk or water, fat, salt, sugar, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

BRbAD

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.

Make the sponge

  1. Dissolve the yeast in ½ cup warm water with ¼ teaspoon sugar.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the scalded milk or water, fat, and salt.

  3. Add the dissolved yeast and sugar to the liquid mixture.

  4. Stir in enough flour to make a stiff drop batter.

  5. Let the batter rise until it doubles in size.

Shape the dough

  1. Add the remaining flour.

  2. Place the dough in an oiled pan.

  3. Let rise again until doubled.

  4. Knead into loaves.

  5. Let rise once more.

Bake

  1. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 30 to 60 minutes, depending on loaf size.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Butter and flour 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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the bread its structure and chew.
Yeast
Produces carbon dioxide as it ferments, making the dough rise and become airy.
Milk or water
Hydrates the flour so gluten can develop; milk adds softness and some browning.
Fat
Tenderises the crumb and adds richness and softness to the loaf.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds a little sweetness and browning.

The step that matters

Stir in enough flour to make a stiff drop batter. Too little flour leaves the sponge too wet to hold gas, while too much stiffens it early and limits rise. Judging the batter's consistency sets up the dough's structure before the remaining flour is added.

“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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