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Light Bread

A yeast bread made with flour, mashed potatoes, and water or milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,611 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Light Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the yeast

  1. Set your yeast at room temperature by mixing 2 tablespoons of flour and 2 tablespoons of mashed potatoes.

  2. Pour in the water from boiling the potatoes and let it cool.

  3. Add ½ cup liquid yeast and keep in a warm place until risen.

Mix and knead

  1. In a mixing bowl, combine the yeast mixture, a small handful of sugar, ¼ teaspoon salt, and 2 quarts of boiled and cooled water or milk.

  2. Add flour and knead until the dough is elastic.

  3. Cover and keep in a warm place until morning.

Shape and bake

  1. Mold into loaves, adding just enough flour to knead, and place in pans.

  2. When risen, bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C).

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. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

  2. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + potatotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its elastic structure and holds the loaf's shape.
Liquid yeast
Ferments the sugars in the dough, producing gas that makes the bread rise.
Mashed potatoes
Adds moisture and starch that help keep the bread soft and fresh.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds a little sweetness and browning to the crust.

The step that matters

Knead until the dough is elastic. Kneading develops gluten, which traps the gas yeast produces. Adding too much extra flour while shaping can make the dough stiff and dense, so use only enough to handle it.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, milk):

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Beetrootfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, milk. 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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