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French Bread

A yeast‑leavened bread made with milk, flour, butter, sugar, and salt, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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French Bread

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

French Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the sponge

  1. Mix warm milk with small beer yeast and strain.

  2. Add fine flour until the mixture is the stiffness of batter.

  3. Cover and let rise in a warm place.

Make the dough

  1. Cream the butter, powdered sugar, and coarse sea salt together.

  2. Incorporate the remaining flour into the creamed mixture.

  3. Make a hole in the center and pour in the risen batter.

  4. Sprinkle flour over and cover.

  5. Use warm milk and water to adjust the dough's consistency; it should be slightly softer than bread dough.

  6. Knead well.

  7. Let rise in a warm place for about 20 minutes.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the dough as desired.

  2. Place on tin plates.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven 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.

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.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + beertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together298 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  4. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Small beer yeast
Ferments the batter, producing gas that makes the dough rise.
Fine flour
Provides the gluten structure that traps gas and holds the loaf's shape.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the crumb and promotes gentle browning.
Powdered loaf sugar
Feeds the yeast and contributes sweetness and browning in the crust.
Warm milk
Adds moisture and milk solids that soften the crumb and aid browning.

The step that matters

Adjust the dough's consistency. Flour absorbs liquid unevenly, so the dough must be checked and softened with warm milk and water to be slightly softer than bread dough. Too stiff a dough rises poorly and bakes dry and dense.

“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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