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Graham Bread (Scald one and one-half cupfuls)
Scald one and one-half cupfuls of milk, turn into a large bowl and add one cupful of cold water, two tablespoonfuls of molasses and one teaspoonful of salt. Add to this mixture, which should be luke warm, one-third of a yeast cake dissolved in three tablespoonfuls of lukewarm water and sift in sufficient graham flour to make a drop batter. Beat hard until smooth, then set the bowl in a pan of warm water, cover closely and stand in a warm place until the batter is very light and filled with bubbles. Sift in more flour until you have a soft dough, then turn out on a wellfloured board and knead until the dough is very smooth to the touch and does not readily adhere to the board or hands. Return to the bowl, renew the hot water, cover as before and stand aside until the dough has fully doubled in bulk. Divide into two equal portions and knead each well until the air bubbles seem of uniform size; then mould into shape and place in a well greased pan. Brush the top with water and let stand until the dough begins to rise; then bake in moderate oven. Bake from fifty minutes to an hour.
A straightforward sponge-and-dough whole wheat loaf, built on a very small amount of yeast and a long, warm rise. Most of what needs translating is the yeast, the flour and the oven.
- The yeast is the hingeCompressed yeast cakes of the period were sold in varying sizes, commonly somewhere around 0.6 oz, so one-third of a cake is on the order of 1/5 oz fresh yeast — very roughly 1/2 to 3/4 teaspoon of instant or active dry. That small quantity is deliberate, and it means the sponge and bulk stages will each likely run to a couple of hours or more. Do not scale it up to modern packet quantities unless you also cut the timings hard.
- Moderate ovenConventionally somewhere in the 350-375F range. At that heat a pair of loaves in the 50-to-60 minute range is right; check for an internal temperature of 190-200F rather than relying on the clock alone.
- Graham flourCoarse whole wheat flour milled from the entire kernel, bran included. Modern stone-ground whole wheat is the closest match; standard whole wheat flour works but gives a finer crumb. "Sift in" here means shaking it through a coarse sieve to break lumps — tip the bran left behind back into the bowl rather than discarding it.
- Scalding the milkUsually explained as deactivating components in raw milk (enzymes and whey proteins) that slacken dough. Pasteurized milk does not need it, though heating and then cooling to lukewarm is a convenient way to hit the right temperature. Lukewarm here means about 100F; hotter than 120F will start to damage the yeast.
- The water bathSetting the bowl in a pan of warm water and renewing it is an early proofing box. A turned-off oven with the light on, or any spot around 80F, does the same job with less fuss.
- "A drop batter" and "a soft dough"The first is thick enough to fall from the spoon in a lump rather than pour, roughly pancake-batter-plus; the second should be tacky but workable. Graham flour absorbs water slowly, so let the dough rest a few minutes before deciding it needs more flour.
- Pans and yieldTwo portions want two pans, despite the singular in the text; standard loaf tins (8x4 to 9x5 inch) suit this quantity. Makes two loaves.
- Brushing with waterThis keeps the surface from skinning over during the final rise and gives a softer crust. A light spritz at the same point in the oven has the same effect.
Graham flour takes its name from Sylvester Graham, the Presbyterian minister and dietary reformer of the 1830s and 1840s who preached that unbolted wheat — bran and germ left in — was morally and physically superior to the fine white flour then becoming cheap. His followers ate coarse bread, and the flour kept his name long after the crusade faded. By the time this recipe was in circulation, graham bread had lost most of its reforming edge and had settled into the American bread chapter as a plain, slightly sweet everyday loaf.