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Bread

Whole Wheat Bread

A yeast‑leavened loaf made with white and whole wheat flour, sugar, salt, and warm water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Whole Wheat Bread

Why it works: Flour and wheat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,373 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Whole Wheat Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Warm the water and place it in a bowl.

  2. Sift in the white flour and beat until free from lumps.

  3. Add the yeast (previously soaked in a little warm water), sugar, and salt; stir thoroughly.

  4. Set the mixture in another bowl of warm water to rise until light, about 2 hours.

  5. Sift in the whole wheat flour, stirring with a spoon at first, then knead with your hands until smooth.

  6. Rub a dish free from crumbs, place the dough in it, and set it back in warm water to rise until light, about 1½ to 2 hours.

Shape and bake

  1. Divide the dough into 2 loaves and place in greased pans.

  2. Let the loaves rise on the table or near the stove in cold weather.

  3. When the pans are nearly full, place them in a 350°F (175°C) oven and bake for 1 hour.

  4. Turn out the loaves and rub the tops with a little butter, but do not cover until cool.

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. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Wheat + sugartop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,071 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

White flour
Builds the main gluten structure that holds the loaf together.
Whole wheat flour
Adds bran and grain body, giving the bread a denser, heartier texture.
Yeast
Ferments the dough so it rises and becomes light and airy.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and helps the crust brown during baking.

The step that matters

Kneading in the whole wheat flour. Whole wheat flour has bran that cuts through gluten strands, so the dough needs thorough kneading until smooth to trap gas well and rise properly.

“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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