Name: Steamed Brown Bread From Stale White Bread
Ingredients: 2 ½ quarts stale white bread, broken into small pieces; 1 quart boiling water; 2 cups yellow cornmeal; ½ cup white flour; 1 teaspoon salt; 2 teaspoons baking soda; ½ to ¾ cup molasses; boiling water as needed

Why it works: Flour and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,429 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Steamed Brown Bread From Stale White Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bread

In a large bowl, break up the stale white bread into small pieces.
Pour the boiling water over the bread and cover closely; let stand for 30 minutes until soft.
Mash the bread until smooth.

Make the batter

Mix in the cornmeal, white flour, salt, and baking soda until well combined.
Moisten the mixture with molasses and enough boiling water to make a thick batter.

Steam and serve

Pour the batter into greased tins and steam for 4 to 6 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.

Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,429 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Bread + flourtop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together10,383 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Bread + molassestop 31% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together529 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Bread and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,383 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

Stale white bread: Soaked and mashed to form the moist, dense body of the loaf.
Yellow cornmeal: Adds bulk and a coarse, crumbly texture to the steamed loaf.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic molasses to lighten the batter and help it rise.
Molasses: Adds sweetness, dark color and a deep flavor while keeping the batter moist.
White flour: Helps bind the batter so the loaf holds together after steaming.

The step that matters

Steam and serve. Steaming for the full 4 to 6 hours keeps the loaf moist and lets the starches set through. Cutting it early can leave it gummy inside.

“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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Steamed Brown Bread From Stale White Bread