Name: Brown Bread, No. I
Ingredients: 4 cups Indian meal; 4 cups wheat meal; 4 cups sour milk; ½ cup molasses; 1 teaspoon baking soda; ¼ teaspoon salt

Why it works: Wheat and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Brown Bread, No. I

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Mix and bake

In a bowl, combine Indian meal, wheat meal, sour milk, molasses, baking soda, and salt, and stir with a spoon until well combined.
Pour the batter into a tin or iron basin.
Bake for about 2 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.

Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,418 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together7,243 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Wheat + molassestop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together702 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Indian meal: Provides the main body and structure of the bread as the bulk of the dry flour.
Wheat meal: Adds body and a heartier texture to the crumb alongside the cornmeal.
Sour milk: Moistens the batter and reacts with the baking soda to help the bread rise.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, moisture and a deep brown colour to the crumb.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidity of the sour milk to produce gas that leavens the bread.

“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.