Skip to main content
Main

Steamed Corn-bread

A moist cornmeal bread steamed with molasses and buttermilk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and buttermilk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Steamed Corn-bread

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine cornmeal, Graham flour, molasses, buttermilk, salt, and baking soda, mixing until well combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a mold.

Steam and serve

  1. Steam for 4 hours.

  2. Serve hot or cold, toasted for tea.

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 + buttermilktop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Molasses + buttermilktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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
Forms the bulk of the crumb and gives the cornbread its structure.
Graham flour
Adds body and a coarser, nutty texture to the crumb.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, depth of flavour and moisture to the batter.
Buttermilk
Provides moisture and acidity that works with the baking soda.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic buttermilk and molasses to lighten the batter.

The step that matters

Steam for 4 hours. Steaming keeps the cornbread moist and cooks it through gently. The water in the steamer must be kept topped up so the mold does not dry out or the bread does not become 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.

You might also like

Molasses SauceMolasses Sauce32 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes