Name: Steamed Indian Bread
Ingredients: 1 quart sour milk; 1½ teaspoons baking soda; ⅓ cup molasses; 3 cups Indian meal; 3 cups all-purpose flour; 1 tablespoon coarse sea salt

Why it works: Milk and flour 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 Indian Bread

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.

Mix the batter

In a large bowl, combine sour milk, baking soda, molasses, Indian meal, flour, and salt, mixing until well combined.

Steam and bake

Pour the mixture into a steamer and steam for 3 hours.
After steaming, bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Toast and serve

To toast, slice the bread ½ inch thick and place in the oven for a few minutes to dry.
Toast on a broiler or toasting fork before serving.

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.

Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,429 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together7,243 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Milk and flour 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

Sour milk: Its acidity reacts with baking soda to produce gas that lightens the bread.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce carbon dioxide, helping the bread rise.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, moisture, and deep color to the bread.
Indian meal: Cornmeal that gives the bread its coarse, hearty texture and flavor.
All-purpose flour: Provides gluten-based structure that holds the bread together.

“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.