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Bread

A Solimemne

A yeast-leavened sweet bread with butter and eggs, baked until lightly colored.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 41,494 recipes mention both. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

The recipe

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

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

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.

Prepare the leaven

  1. In a bowl, mix the leaven with the yeast and warm cream or milk to form a paste.

  2. Cover the mixture and let it rise near a warm place for about 30 minutes.

Make the dough

  1. Make a hollow in the center of the remaining flour.

  2. Add the salt, sugar, egg yolks, butter, and warm cream to the hollow.

  3. Mix gently into a smooth paste.

  4. Flatten the dough on a surface.

  5. Spread the leaven over the dough and knead lightly until well combined.

Bake and serve

  1. Place the dough in a well-buttered cake mold.

  2. Let it rise in a warm place until doubled in size.

  3. Brush the top with beaten egg.

  4. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 1 hour, until lightly colored.

  5. Remove the bread from the mold.

  6. Slice the bread.

  7. Pour melted butter over the slices.

  8. Reassemble the slices and serve immediately.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Cream + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Cream + sugartop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together43,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Flour + buttertop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together122,858 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together118,511 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Flour + eggtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together104,138 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 122,858 recipes mention both: they likely 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 main structure of the dough as its proteins develop with kneading.
Leaven
Its wild yeasts and bacteria leaven the dough and add sourdough flavor.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become airy.
Egg yolks
Add richness, tenderness and color through fat and emulsifiers.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness, richness and a softer crumb.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown during baking.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until doubled. Rising builds the gas bubbles that give the bread its light texture. Underproofed dough bakes dense, while overproofed dough can collapse in the oven.

“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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