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Bread

Coffee Bread

A yeasted bread with raisins, cinnamon, and butter, baked after a long rise.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Coffee Bread

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 the dough

  1. Measure the flour before sifting.

  2. Sift the flour.

  3. Add sugar.

  4. Rub in the butter.

  5. Mix in the yeast.

  6. Add the warm milk.

  7. Knead for 15 minutes.

  8. Cover the dough.

  9. Let it rise all day.

Add the flavourings and let it rise

  1. Add the beaten egg.

  2. Knead thoroughly.

  3. Cover well.

  4. Let rise overnight.

  5. Stir in the cinnamon.

  6. Stir in the raisins.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the dough using as little flour as possible.

  2. Let it rise to the top of the pan.

  3. Bake for 1 hour at 350°F (175°C).

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. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

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

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Gluten proteins form the dough's structure and chewy crumb.
Yeast
Produces carbon dioxide gas that makes the dough rise.
Butter
Fat that tenderises the crumb and adds richness.
Egg
Adds structure and richness, helping the dough hold its shape.
Milk
Adds moisture and hydrates the flour to form dough.
Sugar
Sweetens the bread and feeds the yeast during rising.

The step that matters

Shape the dough using as little flour as possible.. Extra flour worked into the surface dries the dough and makes the baked loaf tough and dense. Light shaping keeps the gluten network soft and the crumb tender.

“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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