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Sugar-crusted Bara Brith

Bara brith (literally 'speckled bread') is a tea-time classic, and it seems that almost every Welsh town and every family has their own recipe

By bbcgoodfood · From Open Recipes · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Black tea and sugar work together. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and 113 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 12
Prep15 min

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Put the mixed fruit and dried cranberries in a bowl, pour over the hot strong black tea, stir, cover and leave to soak for at least 1 hour or overnight.

  2. Heat the oven to 160°C (325°F). Grease a 2 lb (900 g) loaf tin with butter and line the base with baking parchment.

  3. Rub the 100g butter into the self-raising flour with your fingertips until it looks like fine breadcrumbs, then stir in the ground cinnamon, ground ginger and brown sugar.

  4. Beat the eggs, orange marmalade and milk together in a jug, then pour into the flour mixture and stir until just combined.

  5. Add the soaked fruit and any leftover tea, and stir until evenly mixed into a thick batter.

  6. Spoon the batter into the prepared tin and level the top. Scatter the crushed sugar cubes or granulated sugar evenly over the surface.

  7. Bake for about 1 hour 20 minutes, until well risen and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cover loosely with foil if the top browns too quickly.

  8. Leave the loaf in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and leave to cool completely before slicing.

By bbcgoodfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Black tea + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together113 recipes

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

  2. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Orange + cinnamontop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Orange + gingertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,833 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Black tea + gingertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together35 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (black tea, butter, egg, flour, sugar, cinnamon, ginger):

  1. Vanillabetter flavor fit
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Lemonabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Raisinabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against black tea, butter, egg, flour, sugar, cinnamon, ginger. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).