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Bread

Brown Bread

A sweet, dense brown bread made with graham and white flour, cornmeal, molasses and sour milk, baked in cans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Brown Bread

Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Brown Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, graham flour, white flour, cornmeal, molasses, and salt.

  3. In a separate bowl, combine the sour milk or cream with the baking soda, then add to the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly.

Fill and bake

  1. Grease pound baking powder cans and fill them halfway with the batter.

  2. Bake for one hour.

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. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

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

Graham flour
Provides the bulk and the coarse, hearty structure of the crumb.
White flour
Adds gluten-based structure so the bread holds together after steaming.
Cornmeal
Adds a slightly grainy texture and helps give the loaf its body.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and the dark color typical of this bread.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the sour milk to produce gas that lightens the batter.
Sour milk or cream
Its acidity activates the baking soda and its moisture keeps the crumb tender.

The step that matters

Fill the cans only halfway. Baking soda starts producing gas as soon as it meets the acidic sour milk, and the batter keeps rising during baking. Filling the cans halfway leaves room for this rise so the batter does not overflow or become 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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