Nut Bread
Formula No. 1 Sugar, ½ lb.
Molasses, 1 pt.
Shortening, 1 lb.
Water, 2 qts.
Milk powder, 8 ozs.
Flour, 7½ lbs.
Nuts (walnuts, etc.), 2½ to 3 lbs.
Cinnamon, ½ oz.
Bicarbonate soda, 1½ ozs.
Baking powder, 1 oz.
Salt, 1 oz.
Method Put the sugar, molasses, shortening and cinnamon in a bowl and rub to incorporate the ingredients. Now add the water, salt, soda and milk powder, and stir to dissolve the ingredients. Then add the flour and baking powder and mix to a rather stiff batter. When the mixture is smooth, add the nuts and stir to incorporate them. The mixture is now ready to be scaled in greased and dusted forms. Bake at 375 degrees to 385 degrees F.
Formula No. 2 (Nut Bread Yeast Dough) Flour, 10 lbs.
Water, 5½ lbs. (approximately).
Sugar, ½ lb.
Shortening, 12 ozs.
Milk powder, 8 ozs.
Molasses, I/2 pt.
Yeast, 3 ozs.
Nuts, 3 lbs.
Cinnamon, 1/2 oz.
Salt, 2½ ozs.
Method Dissolve the yeast in about one pt. of water and place to one side. Now put the balance of the water in a bowl and add the sugar, salt, milk powder, molasses and cinnamon. Now add the flour. Begin mixing. When partly mixed add the yeast. When the yeast has been incorporated, add the shortening and mix until the dough is smooth. When this stage has been reached add the walnuts, or nuts, and mix thoroughly to incorporate them. This dough should first be fermented before it is scaled in the pans.
Fermentation First rising, 2½ hours; second rising, 1 hour; third rising, 3/4 hour. Allow the dough to rest 15 minutes, when it will be ready for scaling. Scale in pan, give short proof and bake at about 450 degrees.
Nuts have a tendency to discolor the bread, generally giving the bread a purple color in places where they are located. This color is due to an oxidizing enzyme belonging to a class called oxidates. These enzymes oxidize a substance which is present in the lining of walnuts. This can be prevented by washing the nuts in very hot water, to which some sodium bicarbonate has been added. Allow them to thoroughly dry, when they are ready to be used in the dough. The weight of the loaves run from one to one and a half pounds.
Two trade formulas from a bakery journal, written for a shop mixing 7 to 10 pounds of flour at a time. Both scale down cleanly if you work by weight, but one quantity in the first formula looks like a printing error.
- The cinnamon in Formula No. 1Twelve ounces of cinnamon against 7½ lb of flour is roughly 10 percent of the flour weight, which would be inedible and would also dry the batter badly. Read it as a misprint for 1½ oz or ¾ oz; Formula No. 2 uses ½ oz to 10 lb of flour, which is the sane proportion for this style of loaf.
- Scaling Formula No. 1 downDivide by ten for one loaf: 12 oz flour, 2½ oz sugar, 1½ oz shortening, about 3 tablespoons molasses, ¾ cup water, ¾ oz milk powder, 4 to 5 oz nuts, ¾ teaspoon soda, ½ teaspoon baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt, ½ teaspoon cinnamon. That gives a large loaf, at or above the top of the one to one and a half pounds noted at the end.
- "Scale in greased and dusted forms"To scale is to weigh out portions, and forms are loaf pans. Grease and dust means greased then floured. Weigh the batter into the pans so the loaves bake evenly rather than dividing by eye.
- Milk powder and waterThe formulas use dry milk plus water because a bakeshop kept powder on hand. Substituting fluid milk works if you subtract the water accordingly — roughly, 1 oz milk powder plus 9 to 10 fl oz water stands in for 10 fl oz whole milk, with a little extra fat in the milk version.
- Molasses measured by the pintMolasses is denser than water: a pint weighs about 1½ lb, and the half pint in Formula No. 2 about 12 oz. Weigh it rather than converting volume to volume.
- OvenFormula No. 1 gives 375-385F, which is right for a quick bread of this size; expect 45 to 60 minutes for a 1 to 1½ lb loaf, tested to about 205F internal. The 450F in Formula No. 2 is a commercial deck-oven setting for a short-proofed yeast loaf; in a domestic oven 425F is safer, since 450F will set the crust before the crumb is through.
- The three-rise fermentationTwo and a half hours, then one hour, then three quarters — with a 15-minute rest — suits compressed yeast at 3 oz to 10 lb flour. Modern instant yeast at the same weight will overshoot; use about a third as much by weight, or keep the schedule and cut the yeast, judging by the dough rather than the clock.
- The purple streaks around the nutsThe period explanation is essentially correct: compounds in walnut pellicle oxidize and stain the crumb. The hot-water-and-soda wash works, but it also softens the nuts and dulls their flavor. Toasting the walnuts and rubbing off loose skins reduces the staining without a soda bath.
- YieldBoth are shop batches: Formula No. 1 comes to roughly 19 to 20 lb of batter and Formula No. 2 to about 21 lb of dough, which at the one to one and a half pound loaves noted at the end is well over a dozen loaves each. Divide before you start.
Baker's Weekly was one of several American bakery trade papers that ran working formulas for shop use, and nut bread figures among them. What is unusual here is that the journal gives both a chemically leavened version and a yeast-raised one for the same product name, which tells you the loaf was defined by the customer's expectation of a sweet, dark, nut-studded crumb rather than by any particular method. The closing note on enzymatic discoloration is characteristic of the era's trade press, which increasingly explained bakeshop problems in the language of enzymes and oxidation as cereal chemistry became a professional field; the phrasing is dated but the underlying observation about walnut skins holds up.