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Bread

Milk Bread

A yeasted loaf made with milk, flour, lard or butter, sugar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Milk 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.

Make the sponge

  1. Dissolve yeast and sugar in lukewarm milk.

  2. Add 1½ quarts of sifted flour and beat until smooth.

  3. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1½ hours.

Knead and shape

  1. When light, add lard or butter, remaining flour, and salt.

  2. Knead until smooth and elastic.

  3. Place in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise until doubled, about 2 hours.

  4. Mould into loaves and place in greased bread pans, filling them half full.

  5. Cover and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Bake

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 40 to 50 minutes.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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 traps gas and gives the loaf its structure.
Yeast
Produces carbon dioxide during fermentation, which makes the dough rise.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, and its proteins and sugars help the crumb brown.
Lard or butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and keeps the bread soft.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the crust.

The step that matters

Knead until smooth and elastic. Kneading aligns and strengthens gluten strands so the dough can hold the gas produced by yeast. Under-kneaded dough rises poorly and bakes up dense and crumbly.

“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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