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Bread

Sally Lunn

A yeasted wholemeal bread with butter and milk, baked in a quick oven.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sally Lunn

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Warm the milk and butter in a pan together.

  2. Rub the yeast smooth with the sugar, then add the warm milk and butter mixture.

  3. Gradually stir this mixture into the flour.

  4. Add the slightly beaten egg and mix until smooth.

Shape, rise and bake

  1. Divide the dough into two portions and place in well-greased tins.

  2. Set the tins in a warm place for 1 hour to rise.

  3. Bake in a quick oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 15 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Wholemeal flour
Provides the structure of the loaf and the framework that holds the dough's gas.
Egg
Adds richness and helps set the crumb and give it a tender texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, and its sugars help the crust brown.
Butter
Adds fat, which tenderises the crumb and gives a richer flavour.
German yeast
Produces carbon dioxide as it ferments, making the dough rise and become airy.

The step that matters

Rising in a warm place. Yeast needs warmth to ferment, and the dough needs enough time to trap gas and double in size. Under-proofed dough bakes dense, while over-proofed dough can collapse in the oven.

“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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