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Bread

Brown Bread

A dense bread made with cornmeal, wheat flour, molasses, and milk, baked in a lard pail.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Brown Bread

Why it works: Milk and wheat 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

Oven, in the book's wordsA steady oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. In a large bowl, mix the yellow cornmeal, sweet milk, wheat flour, sour milk, salt, baking soda, and molasses until smooth.

  2. Pour the mixture into a well-greased 5-pound lard pail.

Steam and bake

  1. Place the lard pail in a larger pail half full of boiling water.

  2. Cover tightly and cook in a steady oven at 300°F (150°C) for three 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.

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. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  2. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Milk and flour 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

Yellow cornmeal
Forms the bulk of the crumb and gives the bread its coarse, hearty texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that lightens the loaf.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds a slight tang.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture and the dark brown color of the bread.
Wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein that gives the loaf more structure and chew.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and steam in the water bath. Steady, sealed heat keeps the batter moist while it sets. If the lid is loose or the water boils dry, the bread can dry out or bake unevenly.

“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.

More brown bread recipes

Boston 349Steamed 107Pudding 51New England 20Ice Cream 14Biscuits 11 See all 420 →

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