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Bread

Jungborn Whole Wheat Fruit Bread

A loaf of whole wheat bread studded with figs, raisins, and ground nuts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin 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 ↓

Jungborn Whole Wheat Fruit Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Mix the flour with milk instead of water.

  2. Wash, slice, and quarter the figs.

  3. Combine the figs, raisins, and ground nuts into the dough.

Rise and shape

  1. Let the dough rise in a warm place until it doubles in size.

  2. Shape the dough into loaves and place in greased pans.

Bake

  1. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for about two 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.

  1. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Fig + raisintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Wheat + figtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together70 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Whole wheat flour
Forms the dough structure and gives the bread its hearty, nutty body.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the dough and promotes gentle browning in the crust.
Figs
Add natural sweetness and moisture that keeps the crumb tender.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and moisture throughout the loaf.
Ground nuts
Add fat, richness and texture to the crumb.

The step that matters

Letting the dough rise until it doubles. Rising lets yeast produce gas that lightens the dough. Under-proofed dough bakes dense, while over-proofed dough may collapse. Whole wheat dough rises more slowly, so judge by size rather than time.

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (wheat, flour, milk, fig, raisin, butter):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Walnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against wheat, flour, milk, fig, raisin, butter. 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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