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Bread

Milk Teabt

Milk Teabt is a dried bread made from milk, flour, hops, yeast, and Indian meal.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Milk Teabt

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sponge

  1. Mix the milk, salt, and flour together well.

  2. Set the mixture by the fire to keep it lukewarm for about 1 hour.

  3. Boil the hops in the water until only 2 quarts remain.

  4. Strain the boiled hops.

  5. Stir in wheat or rye meal while the liquid is boiling hot until thick like batter.

Raise the dough

  1. Add the yeast when the mixture is lukewarm.

  2. Let the mixture stand until very light, about 3 hours.

  3. Work in sifted Indian meal until it forms a stiff dough.

Shape and dry

  1. Roll out the dough on a floured board.

  2. Cut the rolled dough into oblong cakes, about 3 inches by 2 inches and ½ inch thick.

  3. Place the cakes on a floured board.

  4. Prick the cakes with a fork.

  5. Set the cakes in a dry, clean area with good air circulation.

  6. Turn the cakes daily.

  7. Once fully dry, store the cakes in a coarse cotton bag in a cool, dry place.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + hopstop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Flour + hopstop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

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

Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the dough as it is mixed and set.
Flour
Provides starch and gluten-forming proteins that give the dough structure.
Yeast
Produces carbon dioxide gas, which makes the dough rise and become light.
Hops
Contributes bitterness and aroma to the liquid used in the dough.
Indian meal
Adds body to the dough so it becomes stiff enough to roll and cut.

The step that matters

Add the yeast when the mixture is lukewarm. Yeast is a living organism. If the mixture is too hot it can be killed, and if it is too cold fermentation slows and the dough rises poorly.

“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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