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Bread

Brown Bread A.

A moist loaf made with graham and white flour, molasses, nuts, raisins, and sour milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Brown Bread A.

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

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

  2. In a bowl, mix graham flour, white flour, baking powder, salt, nuts, and raisins.

  3. In another bowl, combine sour milk and baking soda.

  4. In a third bowl, mix molasses and sugar.

Make and bake the bread

  1. Add the sour milk mixture to the molasses mixture, then combine with the dry ingredients.

  2. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.

  3. Bake for 1 hour.

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 + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Nuts + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together490 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Raisin + molassestop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Graham flour
Provides the bulk structure and a hearty, coarse texture.
White flour
Adds gluten-forming structure so the loaf holds its shape.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk to produce carbon dioxide, which lifts the batter.
Baking powder
Supplies additional leavening so the loaf rises during baking.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tenderness.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor.

The step that matters

Combining the sour milk mixture with the dry ingredients. The baking soda must meet the acidic sour milk to release gas for rising, so the batter should be mixed and transferred to the pan promptly rather than left to stand before baking.

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, raisin, milk, molasses, sugar):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits about as well
  4. Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, raisin, milk, molasses, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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