Name: Whole Wheat Bread
Ingredients: 1 cake yeast; 1 large potato, boiled and mashed; 1 pint warm water; flour (to make a stiff batter); 1 quart warm water; 2 cups brown sugar; 4 tablespoons coarse sea salt; 1 teaspoon baking soda; whole wheat flour (to make a very stiff batter)

Why it works: Potato and wheat match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 235 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Whole Wheat Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Make a sponge with the yeast, mashed potato, and warm water, mixing in enough flour to create a stiff batter.
Let the batter rise overnight.
In the morning, add the warm water, brown sugar, coarse sea salt, and baking soda.
Stir in whole wheat flour until the mixture is very stiff.
Let it rise again, but do not let it get too light.
This recipe makes four loaves.

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.

Potato + wheattop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together235 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,373 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,355 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + wheattop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,071 recipes

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