10 July 1880 - 'Bread and Bread-making' by Ruth Lamb - Chapter Two

Having glanced at the origin and early history of the loaf, and seen what it was and still is when in the shape of unleavened bread, we will trace the next step in its progress - the introduction of leaven. It does not seem difficult to imagine how it came into use. It is only needful to leave a portion of the unleavened dough in a warm place for some days, and you will see that it begins to ferment, as though it contained barm of some kind; but the taste is rather sour  and not pleasant.

"A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump." These few words tell the story of leavened breadmaking. A small portion of this sour dough is mixed with the large quantity of flour, salt, and water requisite for the batch of bread, and in time the whole lump is leavened. But it retained, though in a less degree, the sour taste of the little piece put into the lump, and the bread requires a longer time to work than when made with yeast.

In remote country districts on the Continent this mode of leavening bread is still in common use, and English travellers find it anything but agreeable. I well remember that, when in Switzerland a dozen years ago, our party crossed the Gemmi Pass two days sooner than we intended because my husband could not endure the taste of this leavened bread, and there was nothing else to be had at Kendersteg just then. In many other hotels in the mountainous districts we found leavened bread, but with this one exception there were always plenty of the delightful little milk rolls, twists, and "cobs," as we call them in Lancashire, in addition to the sour-tasted loaves.

Brewer's yeast is merely the froth which rises on the surface of beer during the process of fermentation. It is skimmed off when thick enough, as cream is taken from the milk.

When I was a girl, we, whether lived in country towns and villages, were wholly dependent on this kind of yeast, or on a home-made article for lightening our bread. On certain days in each week a stream of small customers might be seen, mug or pitcher in hand, wending their way towards the various breweries, at which as small as quantity as a halfpennyworth of yeast could be purchased. Many an injunction did these young messengers receive not to loiter by the way lest all the yeast should be gone - a calamity of no small consequence. The yeast money was always the special perquisite of the brewer's wife.

On the weekly market-day, one of the first errands of the country carrier was to the brewery. He conveyed a whole string of tin cans, with close-fitting lids; earthenware jugs, with bungs, and of many sizes; and in these he took home yeast  for the village shops, farmers' wives, and cottagers for many a mile round. Probably the motion of the cart would make the barm obstreperous on the homeward way. In spite of the wet rag put on to make the bung or lid fit more tightly, one would fly out with an explosion, the other be lifted off, and some passenger begin to grumble that the froth was trickling on to her bonnet from one of the shelves below the tilt which held the lesser parcels.

Country people are always neighbourly, and yeast was an article much borrowed and lent, not a thing to be rashly or wastefully treated. A little quantity left over was hoarded to make a bit of cake with, or given to a poor neighbour. Baking day only came once a week in cottage homes, new bread being deemed extravagant, and old bread reckoned to go further.

The difficulty of procuring brewer's yeast as often as was requisite, set invention to work to contrive modes of preservation of substitutes for it.

One way of preserving it was by whisking it well, and spreading a thin layer on a large wooden trencher or board. When this was dry another was added, and so on, until the paste was a couple of inches thick, when it was cut up and placed in air-tight canisters until required. Then it was dissolved in warm water and used like fresh yeast.

Potato yeast is made with mealy potatoes; boiled, pounded and passed through a sieve. To 1lb of this pulp add two tablespoonfuls of treacle and boiling water to make it the thickness of brewer's yeast. When just warm stir in two tablespoonfuls of yeast, and keep it in a warm place to ferment for twenty-four hours, when it will be fit for use. It will keep in a cold place for several weeks.

But almost all the substitutes for brewer's barm require just a little of the genuine article to set them going. I will give one recipe for yeast with which the brewer has nothing to do. It is from a very comprehensive treatise on the "Art of Breadmaking," published three quarters of a century ago. Ingredients, 1/2lb flour, 1/2lb coarse sugar, 3/4 peck of malt, bruised. Boil together in 1/2 gallon of water for fifteen minutes. When cooled to 80 degrees, add 1 pint of any water impregnated with fixed air, such as the artificial seltzer (Schweppe's). This will cause fermentation, and when it ceases the clear liquor can be poured off, and the yeast, fit for use, will be found at the bottom.

Many other recipes might be given for artificial yeasts, but fortunately we are much less likely to require them than we were when I made my first loaf. The introduction of German yeast, which is chiefly obtained from the great Continental distilleries, especially those of Holland and Hamburg, has proved a great boon. This is a cleanly article, which comes to us in the form of a light paste with a fresh and pleasant smell, and without the bitter taste of brewer's yeast. This is drained on cloths and pressed dry before being packed for exportation.

I can well remember the dubious looks we cast on the first lump of German yeast offered as a substitute  for the ordinary barm by the baker from whom our flour was purchased, and at a time when brewer's yeast could not be easily obtained. We tried it from necessity; we liked it, and ever after preferred it to anything else. Within a very few years after the introduction of the article, one year's imports up to March 31, 1866, amounted to 5,735 tons! What the quantity has now reached I am unable to tell, but it must be something enormous.

Now having told you about the origin of bread and the various kinds of yeast, we will set about making a batch of household bread such as may be seen all the year round at our table. WE must have 12lbs of fine flour, 3oz German yeast, a good handful of salt, and a jug of warm water. But we need not tuck up our sleeves yet, as we are only going to "set the sponge."

A yellow earthenware pancheon, or, as Lancashire folk call it, a "mug," is the nicest thing to make bread in, and preferable to the large wooden bowl occasionally used.

In winter time the pancheon may be placed near the fire before the flour is put in, as the warmth helps the bread to rise in very cold weather. Dust it carefully with a dry cloth, put in nearly all the flour, into which sprinkle and stir the salt. Dissolve the yeast thoroughly in a pint of warm - *not hot - water, and having made a hole in the middle of the flour, pour it in through a strainer, and stir in with it some of the flour to a paste. Leave it near the fender for half an hour to rise, but do not forget to throw a clean cloth over the top of the pancheon, so that no dust may get in.

So far there has been no need to tuck up your sleeves. But at the half-hour's end mind that hands and nails are thoroughly clean, your cooking apron on, your sleeves secured so that they will not slip down, your large jug of warm water ready, and the small quantity of flour remaining out of the dozen pounds ready to hand in a bowl at the left side of your pancheon, which should stand on a stool. A table is generally too high.

I must mention another matter. Whatever may be your fashion of wearing your hair, have it smoothly and snugly tucked up when engaged in breadmaking or cookery of any kind There is nothing more disgusting or objectionable than to find a hair amongst our eatables; yet nothing more likely to occur if we go about our cooking with our locks hanging loosely about our necks and faces. I have seen a floury hand lifted from amongst the dough to push back a straggling wisp of hair or tuck up a fallen sleeve, and have always registered a mental resolution not to eat home-made bread at that establishment.

Every article used in breadmaking should be of the most spotless cleanliness. Paste-board, rolling-pin, baking-dishes, or tins should be put away clean after use, and carefully rubbed and dusted when taken out again.
Perhaps all these minute details may sound unnecessary, but I am not giving recipes to grown-up people, or merely a history of the origin of bread and a list of its varieties. I want to teach you, dear girls, to make bread as my dear mother taught me when I was a little one many years ago.

Begin to work the dough with the right hand, adding the warm water gradually with your left from the jug which is beside you. Draw the dough from the sides to the middle, using both hands when the ingredients are fairly mixed with the right. It must neither be hard nor soft, but of a sufficient consistency for you to lift it, when very thoroughly worked, in one lump and turn it over. You sprinkle a little flour round to enable you to do this, and if your dough is just what it should be there will be none sticking to the pancheon; it will be clean from everything but a little flour when you lift the dough to turn it.

Now place the pancheon outside the fender, covered as before with a fine white cloth, having sprinkled the flour on the top of the dough to keep it from sticking. It should be ready in less than two hours if the yeast is good. Get your own well-heated, then rub the shelves with a clean, wet dish-cloth; warm and grease your baking-tins or dishes with a little suet, butter, lard, or fresh dripping, held by a little writing paper in the fingers. This is to prevent the bread from sticking to the sides. Then, with clean hands, work a piece of dough on the floured pasteboard; shape it to suit your tin, which should be filled even with the edges. Let it stand on the hearth for a few minutes to rise, and before putting your loaves in the oven, either prick them with a steel fork, or make one or two cuts across the top of each with a sharp knife.

We never use tins for baking in, except for tea cakes. Our baking dishes are of coarse brown earthenware, and stand on four little knobs. With these we rarely have a burnt loaf, however hot the oven may be. A slack oven spoils bread, and the admission of cold air by opening the door should be avoided until the dough has had time to set. To ascertain when the loaf is baked enough, turn it out of the baking-dish and press the side firmly with the point of the finger. If the crust springs back you may judge that it is right; but if the pressure leaves a hollow, the loaf must be returned to the oven. When the dough is first put in, it should be placed on the oven bottom; and when well set and about half baked removed to the top to "soak" as it is technically termed. When sufficiently baked the loaves should be taken out of the dishes or tins, and placed on their sides; when quite cold we put ours in a large pancheon, and cover them with a clean cloth. This preserves the moistness of the bread and conduces to cleanliness also.

Many persons only use 2oz of German yeast to 12lbs of flour, but we prefer the larger quantity, and every one praises our home-made bread as being simply perfect. Our cook prides herself more upon it than upon the most dainty dish she prepares for the dinner-table. One day when she was far from well I suggested that she should suspend her bakings for a little time, and let us buy our bread in order to lighten her work. But this she promptly declined, adding, "It would be of no use, ma'am, for if everybody else in the house could put up with bought bread, *I couldn't."

I should add a word or two with regard to the quality of your ingredients. Buy thoroughly good flour; keep it in a dry place, as damp flour is bad. Never use doubtful yeast. It is poor economy to spoil a batch of bread in order to *use up yeast, or milk which is not perfectly sweet.

The Austrian flour, made from wheat frown on the banks of the Danube, is particularly fine. It goes into a very small compass, and absorbs an immense quantity of water. Some while ago when staying at a delightful farmhouse in summer we had a little difficulty about bread. At length a small shopkeeper, who sold everything, undertook to bake for us; and exquisite bread she made. But she bargained that she should be allowed to use what she called "ostrich flour," though it would be a trifle dearer. She meant Austrian.

Aerated bread is made by a patented process. It is mixed in a sort of iron box, with water charged with fixed air, or carbonic acid gas, which lightens the dough without the aid of yeast. The whole operation is performed by machinery, and the hand does not touch the dough. The bread is very light and digestible, and is said to effect a saving of ten per cent in flour, besides economising time and labour. But I do not find it so satisfying as ordinary bread, and have heard children complain that they soon feel hungry again after eating it.

There is also a self-raising flour, which is a good deal used for making cakes and pastry. It is prepared by Messrs McDougall, of Manchester, and the scones, tea-cakes, etc., made from it are very light and agreeable to eat, but none of these articles, to my mind, make ordinary home bread less enjoyable in comparison.

Delicious brown bread may be made in the same way as the white by using "ground down," or the whole of the powdered grain of wheat without removing any portion.

A mixture of rye with fine wheaten flour makes exquisitely sweet bread, and may be made with equal parts, or with only a third or a fourth portion rye. Rye flour is sticky to the touch, and the dough must be made very stiff. It is much nicer when baked in *thick cakes on the oven shelf than in loaves.

French bread has a pint of new milk, two eggs, and a 1/4lb of butter well mixed in with three quarts of water, or as much as will make 18lbs of flour of the proper consistency. Yeast and salt added in the same proportions as for home-made bread. This liquor is stirred into the flour until all is well mixed. When ready for baking it is made into loaves or bricks, which are turned over when half done, and the crust well browned. When quite cold, the loaves are rasped, or else chipped with a knife. Bran bread is made by adding a basinful of bran to 6lbs of flour, and working in the ordinary way Barley-bread, from the flour of barley carefully freed from the husks and made like rye-bread.

Potato bread is made by mixing mealy potatoes boiled and pounded in the proportion of 3lbs to 9lbs of flour. Make in the ordinary way and bake in a very hot oven. The bread is very light, but less nutritious than the pure wheaten. Were I to enumerate all the kinds of bread I should occupy far too much space. Maize, rice, beans, peas, acorns, chestnuts, turnips, and a variety of roots and barks of trees, have been used in seasons of scarcity and by various nations; so that read, or a substitute for it, however coarse, might not be wholly wanting to the very poorest.

29 May 1880 - 'Bread and Bread-Making, in two chapters' by Ruth Lamb - Chapter One

I wonder how many out of the millions of people who sit down two, three or even four times a day to eat bread together ever bestow a thought as to the origin of the loaf of which they partake so frequently, and which forms a portion of nearly every meal. Most of us know that our ordinary bread is made from wheaten flour, water, salt and yeast in some form. Everybody eats it, from the Queen upon the throne to the meanest of her subjects, and knows  that to want bread is deemed one of the most terrible calamities that can fall on any person.

Yet bread, being such a very common thing, we are rather apt to class it with water, and to look upon it as a mere matter of course.

Few of us consider how many experiments must have been tried, failures experienced, and inventions perfected before the fair white loaf, as we have it now, was ever placed upon a table, to say nothing of the endless varieties which have sprung from it.

When I was a little girl, and for a good many years afterwards, it used to be considered no mean accomplishment to make good bread; and children were taught to do it very early, especially in country homes. Well can I recall the feeling of pride when as a little mite of a lass I was first allowed to try my hand at bread-making. How I put on my wide pinafore, and scrubbed and washed at hands and nails until they satisfied my mother, one of the most particular of human beings as to cleanliness. We children had nothing but short sleeves in those days, so there were none to tuck up, and I plunged my little red arms up to the elbows in flour in a sort of ecstasy of delight.

I felt positively almost grown-up, so impressed was I with the importance of my work as family bread-maker.

Betty, our old kitchen servant, looked on approvingly, and was little less interested than myself. I had seven pounds of flour in a yellow earthenware pancheon, a small handful of salt, some brewer's yeast, and a large jug of warm water, and I supposed nothing else was wanted. But Betty said - "Now, Miss Ruth, if you want your bread to be real good, you must not stint it of one thing."

"What is that?" I asked. "Mother told me there were only these four things wanted to make my bread with."

Betty replied to my question b asking another. "Do you remember going with me to my old mother's cottage last summer, and asking what made the round table that was turned up in the corner, as bright as a looking-glass?"

"Yes, and you told me 'nothing but elbow grease.'

"I asked where it was bought, and you all laughed at me; but when I came home mother told me it meant good rubbing, which exercised elbows, and was called in joke 'elbow grease.'"

"That's it, my dear," said Betty, "and you want plenty of it in bread too; not in the way of rubbing, but kneading. Work it well. Don't spare labour and the bread will pay for it."

"So it did. I thought no loaf had ever tasted so sweet as did my first. My little arms ached, but I forgot that when they all praised my bread next morning; but I never forgot Betty's lesson, though conveyed in a homely fashion, that one  great secret of good bread-making is good kneading, or, in her words, plenty of elbow-grease.

I cannot help regretting that amongst city girls especially bread-making is daily becoming a rarer accomplishment.

I have asked many girls, "Have you learned to make bread?" and the almost invariable answer has been, "No, the baker brings ours." I am tempted to wish that they might all in turn be transplanted for a few weeks to some out-of-the-way country place, where a baker's visits are unknown, and obliged to make and bake their bread before they ate it.

The world was more than two thousand years old when bread, as such, was mentioned in the Bible, as being brought out by Melchisedek  for the refreshment of victorious Abram. But of what kind it was we know nothing.

It is, however, possible to tell what the first loaves ever used were made of, and there is at present no kind of bread which at all corresponds with them. The grain was neither ground nor bruised. IT was soaked, or in some cases boiled wheat, pressed into shape and dried. A very sticky indigestible sort of cake this would be, not too pleasant to the taste; probably a little of it would go a very long way.

The next step was when the happy thought struck somebody to bruise or pound the grain. Hard work it would be, and even when another step was achieved and corn was actually ground, the labour was very great, as it was all done by hand. The women slaves were employed to do the grinding by means of portable millstones, the uppermost being turned by a sort of wooden handle.

Such mills were used in Egypt, as named in Exodus. Such were still in existence in this country not so many generations back, and they were called querns.

Who first found out the art of making leavened bread is as much a mystery as the inventor of the first mill, and the process of fermenting dough by means of leaven was as tedious as the primitive mode of grinding corn and separating the husk from the finer portion of the grain, which we call flour.

This would be the reason whether Abraham, Lot and, several centuries later, Gideon offered unleavened cakes baked on the hearth to their angel visitants. The use of leaven was known; but leavened bread could not be quickly prepared, baked and served fresh and hot from the hearth like those cakes made without it.

Look back, dear girls of this nineteenth century, some nineteen hundred years more, beyond  the era from which we date, and try to realise what sort of a batch of bread was baked by Sarah  for the entertainment of the guests who were espied by her husband as he stood at his tent door on the plains of Mamre.

As nearly as can be calculated those three measures of mine meal - they had learned the art of sifting it, you see, in those days - made fifty-six pounds weight of bread, all baked in thin cakes on the hearth.

This would be heating by means of a fire which was burning on the bread stone, while the meal was simply mixed with salt and warm water into a stiff dough, and rolled out into very thin cakes. Then the hearth-stone was clean swept, the cakes placed on it and hot cinders above them. In this primitive fashion was the great batch of unleavened bread prepared; and by whom?

Not by servants, but by a lady, a princess by station, who had a vast retinue of attendants ready to do her bidding; the wife of an enormously wealthy man, who was the ally of kings, the friend of God Himself!

A beautiful lady, too, - so fair, indeed, that twice in her life, at the age of sixty-five and at ninety, she was admired and sought after by kings. But when Abraham bade her get ready the meal, knead the dough, and bake the cakes, she simply and cheerfully obeyed him whom she called "lord."

Not many of you, dear girls, are born to fill such a position as here was; but I am afraid plenty of modern young ladies are to be found who would rebel if requested even to superintend such a baking. But if any of you should be tempted to despise what may appear in your eyes such menial work, think of this princess of a bygone age, rich and fair, and learn a lesson as you catch a glimpse of her on a baking-day.

In these days unleavened bread still appears in many forms, and as this is the most primitive kind we will look at its varieties first. Amongst these are the Jewish Passover cakes - extremely thin, crisp biscuits, still eaten for a week by Jews during the seven days of the Passover.

Scotch oat bread, made of oatmeal, salt and water, into a stiff paste, rolled thin and baked on an iron girdle or thick plate of iron with semi-circular handle. In the North Riding of Yorkshire girdle or griddle cakes used to be baked on the top of a flat stone heated from below in the same way as the iron article. It was called a bak'ston', or bakestone, by country folk.

A farmer's wife was made extremely happy by the gift of an iron girdle; but she retained the old name for her baking apparatus, and was wont to shout to her serving maid, "Jenny, bring me the iron bak'ston'."

American damper is made without leaven, but the cakes are thicker than the Scotch oaten bread.

Then there are corn cakes," made of the meal of Indian corn. "Hominy cake," the same grain boiled to a pulp, and afterwards baked in thin cakes.

In Lincolnshire, my native country, unleavened cakes are very common. They are precisely the same thing as those made by Abraham's wife, only they are rolled out round and thin, and baked in the oven instead of on the hearth.

In the mowing season and during the harvest the labourers' wives would be up between four and five in the morning to bake these cakes for their husbands. They were eaten very hot, and either split open and buttered or accompanied by thin slices of fat bacon. Then a goodly pile of these bacon sandwiches, prepared while hot, would be packed up  for the good man's refreshment when afield.

I asked the wife of one why she got up so early to bake every morning, and made this kind of cake. "Oh!" she said, "they stay on the stomach longer, and a man can work far better on these than on lighter bread. I never grudge the trouble for our George (her husband), for mowing's hard work."

It was easy to understand this explanation. These hot cakes were less digestible than ordinary bread; and hard work in the open air, with the profuse perspiration caused by labouring in the broiling sun, made him require frequent nourishment and of a very solid kind.

"He'd feel empty and hungry directly on light bread. 'Sad cakes' are best," said she, "for working men."

A visitor in my old home heard the expression "sad cakes" - meaning unleavened - and inquired what kind of things they were. On being told, she looked much astonished, and said, "I thought they must be cakes used for funerals."

"Sad bread" is simply heavy bread, whether made without yeast or any kind or with yeast that has done its duty imperfectly, and has left the loaf close and sticky, instead of light and full of small holes.

Before leaving the unleavened varieties of bread, I should like to show you how those large, thin, crisp sheets of oat-cake are made and baked in the west of Yorkshire, where I spent one very happy year as a girl in a country parsonage.

I was told when I went there from a county in which oat cake was unknown that I should soon learn to like it. And so I did; and I was curious to know how these large sheets could be rolled to such a delicate thinness.

"They are not rolled at all," said my friend, "they are thrown."

I was more puzzled than before, and asked what she meant.

"You had better go to our baker's and see the process," she replied, "and you will understand it much better than by my description. To-morrow is a baking day and you can go in the morning with Lily," meaning her daughter. "Many of the cottagers take their own meal to the baker, or bakeress. Mrs Marsden, and she charges them three-halfpence per four pounds weight for making and baking it."

The next morning we went to the bakehouse and found Mrs Marsden literally at full swing with her oat cake. Her stove was a thick iron plate, about two feet long, set in brickwork, and heated by a fire underneath it. Beside her stood a wooden vessel like a barrel churn, containing a batter made of oatmeal, salt and water. I am inclined to think a little yeast was used to lighten this, as bubbles kept rising on the surface. A bowl of dry meal, a pasteboard scored in diamonds instead of being smooth as is usual, a wooden ladle, and an oblong piece of coarse linen, completed her materials. First throwing a handful of dry meal o board, she next poured on it a ladleful of the batter, and shook it into an even shape. Then she dexterously transferred the latter from the board to the mealy cloth, which she lifted with both hands, laying lightly hold of opposite corners. Then, with a rapid movement, she threw the batter in a large oblong sheet on the heated iron plate, dropping the lower corner of the cloth as she did so. In half a minute the cake was ready to be turned with a wooden spatula, and in a similar time to be taken off and hung across a wooden rail.

The rapidity with which this operation was performed showed the fruits of long practice, together with the steady hand and correct eye of the baker. The stream of batter always ran along the iron plate almost to its edges, and so thinly was it spread that it was absolutely in small holes, yet without ever being broken. T throw oat cake very thin is deemed a mark of an accomplished hand.

Whilst we stood waiting and looking on, piles of these newly baked and perfectly soft cakes were brought away by the neighbouring cottagers. Each had with her a clean towel, folded lengthways in the middle. This was thrown across one arm, opened, the dozen of oat cakes placed on it; then they were covered with the other portion, and so carried home to be hung on the rack - a wooden frame suspended from the kitchen ceiling. IN a few hours, the cakes would be perfectly crisp and as brittle as thin glass.

Biscuits of various substantial kinds contain no leaven, especially those used at sea. They are made with very little water, and dried very much in the baking. The name means twice baked.

In another short chapter an account will be given of the various kinds of leaven, yeasts, and of plain and fancy breads now in use in various countries, with reliable recipes for young readers to follow, if they wish to become good bread-makers.