Why it works: Flour and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,429 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Brown Bread
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix flour, cornmeal, molasses, salt, and baking soda.
Add enough cold water to create a batter similar to cake batter.
Steam and serve
Pour the batter into a well-greased can or quart pail.
Place the can in a kettle of boiling water, cover the kettle, and steam for 2½ hours.
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.
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Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together10,429 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
- Cornmeal
- Provides the bulk and coarse, hearty texture of the loaf.
- Molasses
- Adds moisture, sweetness, and a deep, dark colour to the bread.
- All-purpose flour
- Gives structure so the batter holds together during steaming.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidity in molasses to produce gas that lightens the loaf.
The step that matters
Keeping the kettle boiling during steaming. Steaming cooks the batter gently and evenly through moist heat. If the water drops below a simmer and the kettle is not kept covered, the bread cooks unevenly and may turn out dense and gummy.
“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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