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German Coffee Bread

A yeasted bread with raisins, topped with a sweet cinnamon butter glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

German Coffee Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the dough

  1. Combine scalded milk, butter, sugar, and salt in a bowl.

  2. Let the mixture cool until lukewarm.

  3. Add dissolved yeast cake and beaten egg to the mixture.

  4. Stir in enough flour to form a stiff batter.

  5. Fold in the raisins.

  6. Cover the bowl and let the dough rise overnight.

Shape and top

  1. Spread the dough in a buttered baking pan to a thickness of ½ inch.

  2. Cover and let the dough rise again.

  3. Brush the top with a beaten egg.

  4. Melt 3 tablespoons of butter.

  5. Mix in ⅓ cup sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon.

  6. Stir in 3 tablespoons of flour.

  7. Spread the mixture over the dough.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the gluten structure that holds the batter and dough together.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the dough and topping.
Egg
Adds structure and richness to the dough, and a glossy browned top.
Sugar
Sweetens the dough and topping and helps the top brown.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise overnight. Yeast needs time to produce enough gas to lighten the stiff batter; underproofing leaves a dense crumb, while the second rise lets the dough expand before baking.

“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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