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Bread

Yankee Brown Bread

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

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Rye and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,320 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Yankee Brown Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Mix the batter

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

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased baking dish.

Bake

  1. Steam or bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven 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 + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,320 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Flour and milk 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

Indian meal
Provides the bulk and coarse, corn-based structure of the bread.
Rye meal
Adds a dense texture and a deeper, earthy flavour to the loaf.
All-purpose flour
Adds gluten-based structure that helps hold the loaf together.
Thick sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to lift the batter and adds moisture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture to the crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that leavens the bread.

The step that matters

Baking soda and sour milk. Baking soda needs an acid to react and release carbon dioxide. Stirring the batter only until combined keeps the gas bubbles from escaping, so the loaf rises evenly rather than staying dense.

“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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