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Bangor Brownies

A chocolate brownie with walnuts baked at 350°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and walnut are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,548 recipes. Both carry 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine, which smells roasted, nutty. The science ↓

Bangor Brownies

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.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together until smooth.

  2. Add the melted chocolate and mix well.

  3. Incorporate the eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition.

  4. Stir in the pastry flour and chopped walnuts until just combined.

Bake

  1. Spread the batter onto baking tins.

  2. Bake for 15 minutes in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C).

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. Chocolate + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + walnuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Butter and flour 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

Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add richness and tenderness.
Sugar
Creams with butter for structure and adds sweetness and moisture.
Baker's chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavour and fat that keeps the brownies rich and fudgy.
Eggs
Bind the batter and set during baking to give structure.
Pastry flour
Provides the light structure that holds the brownies together.
Walnuts
Add texture and a toasty, nutty flavour.

The step that matters

Stir in the flour and walnuts until just combined. Once flour meets liquid, gluten begins to form, and overmixing makes the brownies tough and cakey rather than tender.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, chocolate, egg, flour):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Macadamia nutfits better
  3. Hazelnutfits better
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, chocolate, egg, flour. 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.

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