Skip to main content
Bread

Raisin Brown Bread

A steamed and baked raisin bread made with rye, cornmeal, white flour, molasses, sour milk, and sweet milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Raisin Brown Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Mix the batter

  1. Mix and sift the rye flour, cornmeal, and white flour with baking soda and salt.

  2. Add molasses and thick sour milk, then mix in sweet milk.

  3. Fold in the halved raisins.

Steam and bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a greased mold and steam for 3 hours.

  2. Uncover and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about 10 minutes or longer.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Rye + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,320 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Rye + raisintop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  4. Rye + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together918 recipes

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

  5. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to release gas, lifting the dense batter.
Thick sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds tang while keeping the crumb moist.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark colour, and moisture, and contributes to the bread's depth of flavour.
Rye flour
Adds flavour and a tender, moist crumb with less gluten structure than white flour.
White flour
Provides the gluten structure that holds the bread together.
Cornmeal
Adds a coarse, slightly crumbly texture and a mild sweet corn flavour.

The step that matters

Steaming for the full 3 hours. Steam keeps the batter moist and lets the leavening set the crumb gently. Letting water run low or lifting the lid early can cause a dry, sunken, or uneven loaf.

“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.

More raisin bread recipes

Pudding 13Cake 12Molasses 5Steamed 4English 3Spiced 3 See all 42 →

You might also like

CornbreadCornbread345 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding336 recipesMilk Bread RollsMilk Bread Rolls242 recipesPotato BreadPotato Bread124 recipes