I grew up in Nova Scotia, Canada and my grandmother used to make what she called "brown" bread she used to make it every time she would make homemade baked beans. She is no longer with us and I'm trying to track down this little bit of my childhood. Any suggestions on a "brown" bread, I believe it was made with molasses and it was quite moist and filling.
2 Answers
Googling brown bread Nova Scotia provides a plethora of recipes. Here are some common traits:
- Contains molasses, just as you said
- Contains some other grain than simply flour - oatmeal, shredded wheat, and whole grain wheat were among the contenders
- Uses shortening to enrich the dough (in some cases butter as well, but shortening was in all recipes)
I'd recommend googling for recipes and picking one which reminds you of your grandmother's.

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Homemade Nova Scotia Brown Bread - step by step instructions
In very large mixing bowl that has a cover mix together:
3 cups boiling water 3 Tablespoons crisco shortening 3 level teaspoons salt 1 heaping cup quaker quick rolled oats 1/4 cup wheat germ (optional- can increase oats by 1/4 cup) 3/4 cups fancy molasses mix well - let stand till luke warm -then-
In separate bowl: 1. stir 2 rounded teaspoons sugar into 1 cup warm water 2. over top of water and sugar mixture - sprinkle 2 Tablespoons fleischmanns traditional active dry yeast let stand 10 minutes till bubbly
- mix yeast mixture into - rolled oats and molasses mixture
- add 3 cups robin hood all purpose flour - beat with mixer
- mix in 5 more cups flour by hand
knead well
wash out bowl: dry and grease it really well with margarine
place bread in bowl - put cover on
let rise 1 hr or until double in size press bread down - knead lightly shape into loaves or rolls - put into pans= rub marge on hands and lightly pat tops of bread - cover with slightly damp tea towel let rise in pans 1 hour or till double bake 35 minutes @ 350* -- remove from pans - cool on wire racks - turn side to side couple times