Skip to main content
Main

Nut Loaf

A savory loaf made with butter, flour, milk, rice, breadcrumbs, nuts, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Nut Loaf

Why it works: Pepper and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Nut Loaf

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.

Make the sauce base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour and stir until smooth.

  3. Gradually add the milk and cook until thick.

Mix and shape

  1. Stir in the salt, pepper, Worcestershire sauce, paprika, poultry seasoning, onion, celery, rice, bread crumbs, and nuts.

  2. Finally, mix in the lemon juice.

  3. Shape the mixture into a loaf and place it in a baking dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 300°F (150°C) for one hour, basting often with melted butter.

  2. Serve with tomato sauce.

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.

  1. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Celery + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and flavor, and basting with melted butter helps the surface brown and stay moist.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth white sauce that binds the loaf.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that moistens the mixture.
Cooked rice
Adds bulk and body, helping the loaf hold its shape while staying tender.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add soft structure that helps bind the loaf.
Nuts
Provide the main texture and rich, toasty flavor of the loaf.

The step that matters

Thickening the sauce. Flour must be stirred smooth into the butter before the milk is added gradually, and the sauce cooked until thick. Lumps or undercooked flour leave a pasty taste and weaken the mixture's binding, so the loaf may fall apart when sliced.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, pepper, sauce, celery, rice):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, pepper, sauce, celery, rice. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.

More nut loaf recipes

Cake 7 See all 36 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesLemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesRice FrittersRice Fritters84 recipes