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Bread

Boston Brown Bread

A steamed bread made with rye and Indian meal, sour milk, molasses, salt, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Rye and milk work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 918 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Boston Brown Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine the rye meal and Indian meal.

  2. Add the sour milk and molasses, and mix well.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in a little hot water and add it to the mixture along with the salt. Stir until well combined.

Rise and steam

  1. Pour the batter into a greased pan.

  2. Let it rise for 1 hour.

  3. Steam the bread for 4 hours.

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. Rye + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together918 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Rye + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together804 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Rye meal
Adds a dense, hearty structure and a earthy flavour to the loaf.
Indian meal
Gives the loaf its coarse, crumbly body and sets its texture.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the bread rises and gains a slight tang.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture to the finished bread.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the sour milk to produce gas that lightens the batter.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda before mixing. Baking soda must be fully dissolved and evenly distributed through the batter so it reacts with the acidic sour milk. Clumps leave pockets of bitter residue and uneven rising.

“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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