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Bread

Browk Bread

A moist bread made with flour, cornmeal, molasses, salt, and baking soda, steamed then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,429 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Browk Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix the baking soda and molasses together thoroughly.

  2. Add the flour, cornmeal, salt, and enough cold water to make a stiff batter.

Steam and bake

  1. Steam the mixture for 3 hours.

  2. Bake for 30 minutes.

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 + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas that lightens the cornbread.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture, and reacts with the baking soda.
Cornmeal
Provides the main body and grainy texture of the bread.
Flour
Adds structure so the batter holds together after cooking.

The step that matters

Mixing the baking soda and molasses thoroughly. Baking soda must be evenly distributed through the acidic molasses so it reacts throughout the batter; pockets of unmixed soda can leave bitter spots 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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