Name: Nut Loaf
Ingredients: 3 cups stale bread crumbs; 1½ cups chopped hickory nuts; 1½ cups seeded raisins; ½ teaspoon coarse sea salt; hot water

Why it works: Nuts and raisin work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 490 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Nut Loaf

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

In a bowl, mix stale bread crumbs, chopped hickory nuts, seeded raisins, and coarse sea salt.
Add enough hot water to moisten the mixture and let it stand covered for 10 minutes.

Bake and serve

Add 1 cup more of hot water and transfer the mixture to a buttered pan.
Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 1¼ hours.
Serve cold.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Nuts + raisintop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together490 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Bread + raisintop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,111 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Bread + nutstop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together174 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

Stale bread crumbs: Absorb moisture and provide the body that holds the loaf together.
Hickory nuts: Add fat and a rich, toasty flavor, and give the loaf its bite.
Seeded raisins: Add moisture and natural sweetness that balances the nuts.
Hot water: Softens the bread crumbs so they blend and bind with the other ingredients.