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Bread

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A steamed brown bread made with meal, graham flour, sour milk, molasses, raisins, salt, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

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Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine meal, graham flour, salt, and baking soda.

  2. In another bowl, mix sour milk and molasses.

  3. Pour the liquid mixture into the dry ingredients and stir until combined. Add raisins and mix gently.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the batter into a greased mold or bucket.

  2. Steam for 4 to 5 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + raisintop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

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

Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas, lifting and leavening the batter.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tang to the crumb.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, moisture and a rich flavor to the bread.
Graham flour
Provides the bulk of the structure and a coarse, hearty texture.
Meal
Adds bulk and a grainy texture that gives the bread body.

The step that matters

Pour the batter into a greased mold or bucket. Because the batter relies on baking soda reacting with sour milk for rise, it should be mixed and portioned promptly, and the mold should be greased and filled no more than about two-thirds full so it has room to expand during steaming.

“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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