By I crossed the bridge to Anapra on Wednesday. The weekly visit. Lupita's conchas are excellent — eight years of practice, eight years of Rosa's recipe in her hands. The neighborhood women come at dawn. The children come after school. The bakery is what I dreamed it would be: a place that smells like home in a neighborhood that needed home.
Standing in Lupita’s bakery, watching the women arrive before the sun was fully up, I kept thinking about the kind of bread that anchors a place — not showy, not complicated, just deeply, quietly nourishing. On the drive home I knew I wanted to make something in that spirit: this gooey old-fashioned steamed molasses bread, which carries the same dark warmth as a neighborhood bakery at dawn, the kind of smell that tells you without words that someone was here, and they were thinking of you.
Gooey Old-Fashioned Steamed Molasses Bread
Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 2 hours | Total Time: 2 hours 15 minutes | Servings: 8
Ingredients
- 2 cups whole wheat flour
- 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 3/4 cup unsulfured molasses
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1/2 cup raisins (optional)
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, for greasing the mold
Instructions
- Prepare the steamer. Fill a large pot with 2 to 3 inches of water and bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Grease a 1-quart pudding mold or a standard 9x5 loaf pan thoroughly with butter.
- Mix the dry ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and cloves until evenly combined.
- Add the wet ingredients. Pour the molasses and buttermilk into the dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon until just combined — do not overmix. Fold in raisins if using.
- Fill and seal the mold. Pour the batter into the prepared mold, filling it no more than 3/4 full. Cover tightly with a double layer of aluminum foil secured with kitchen twine or the mold’s lid.
- Steam the bread. Place the mold on a rack or folded towel inside the pot so it sits above the water. Cover the pot and steam over medium-low heat for 2 hours, checking the water level every 30 minutes and adding more boiling water as needed.
- Test for doneness. Insert a skewer or thin knife into the center — it should come out clean. If not, re-cover and steam an additional 15 minutes.
- Cool and unmold. Remove the mold from the pot and let it rest for 10 minutes before running a knife around the edges and turning out onto a wire rack. Slice and serve warm.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 210 | Protein: 5g | Fat: 2g | Carbs: 45g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 280mg