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Rye and Indian Bread
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One quart of rye meal or rye flour, two quarts of Indian meal, scalded (by placing in a pan and pouring just enough boiling water over it, stirring constantly with a spoon, to merely wet it, but not enough to make it into a batter), one-half tea-cup molasses, two teaspoons salt, one of soda, one tea-cup yeast; make as stiff as can be stirred with a spoon, mixing with warm water, and let rise all night; then put in a large pan, smooth the top with the hand dipped in cold water, let it stand a short time, and bake five or six hours. If put in the oven late in the day, let it remain all night. Graham may be used instead of rye, and baked as above. In the olden time it was placed in kettle, allowed to rise, then placed on the hearth before the fire, with coals on top of lid, and baked. Mrs. Charles Fullington, Marysville, Ohio.
A brown-bread dough of the New England type, adapted for the oven rather than the steamer. The long bake is the point of it, not a misprint.
- Indian mealPlain yellow or white cornmeal, stone-ground if you can get it. Scalding it, as directed, swells the starch so the loaf is not gritty; add the boiling water a little at a time and stop while the meal is damp and crumbly, not soupy.
- Rye meal vs rye flourRye meal is coarsely ground whole rye; rye flour is the finer sifted product. Either works, but medium or dark rye flour is closer to what this book means than the light rye sold for deli loaves. Graham, offered as a substitute, is coarse whole wheat.
- A tea-cup of yeastThis means a cup of liquid yeast or barm kept going in the kitchen, not dry granules. A couple of teaspoons of modern yeast slaked in a cup of warm water is the usual modern stand-in, though the equivalence is only approximate; the overnight rise is what develops the flavour either way.
- Yeast and soda togetherThe teaspoon of soda is probably not redundant: long-fermented rye and cornmeal doughs turn sour overnight, and soda would neutralise that acidity and give a final lift when the loaf hits the heat. Note that the recipe puts the soda in with everything else, before the overnight rise.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given; a loaf left in five or six hours, or overnight, implies a falling or slow heat, in the region of 275-300F. At anything hotter the crust sets hard long before the dense centre is cooked.
- The pan"A large pan" suggests a deep bake pan rather than a standard loaf tin; the kettle mentioned at the end belongs to the older hearth method, not to this oven bake. The dough is heavy and rises little in the oven, so a deep vessel not filled to the brim suits it. Smoothing the top with a wet hand, as directed, gives an even surface.
- Judging donenessTime alone is unreliable at this size. The loaf is done when a skewer comes out clean and the internal temperature is around 205-210F; the crust will be very dark and firm, which is expected.
- Yield and keepingThree quarts of meal makes a very large loaf, considerably bigger than a modern tin loaf. It slices best fully cooled, cuts cleanly with a thin sharp knife or a length of thread, and is at its best the next day, sliced thick and toasted or buttered.
Rye and Indian bread is a staple loaf of the northern colonies carried west: rye and maize grew reliably where wheat did not, and the two were combined for generations before wheat flour became cheap and general. A similar pairing, with the addition of a third grain and long steaming rather than baking, produces Boston brown bread; here it is raised with yeast and baked dry instead. The closing note about the kettle set on the hearth with coals heaped on the lid records the older method plainly, which is why it is worth having, and the attribution to Mrs. Charles Fullington of Marysville, Ohio is typical of the subscription cookbooks of the period, which were assembled from contributions solicited by name from housekeepers across many states, and which borrowed freely from one another.