Bread is staple food of European, Middle Eastern and Indian cultures which is prepared by baking, steaming, or frying dough. Bread consists minimally of flour and water; salt is present in most cases; and usually a leavening agent such as yeast is used. Breads may also contain some amounts of sugar, spices, fruit (such as raisins, pumpkin or bananas), vegetables (like onion or zucchini), nuts, or seeds (such as caraway, sesame or poppy seeds). There are a wide variety of breads, with preferences differing from region to region.

Fresh bread is prized for its taste and texture, and retaining its freshness is important to keep it appetizing. Bread that has stiffened or dried past its prime is said to be stale. Modern bread is often wrapped in paper or plastic film, or stored in airtight containers such as a breadbox to keep it fresh longer. Bread that is kept in warm moist environments is prone to the growth of mold. It becomes stale more quickly in the low temperature of a refrigerator, although by keeping it cool, mold is less likely to grow.

The inner soft part of bread is referred to as the crumb (not to be confused with small bits called "crumbs"). The outer hard part of bread is called the crust. The latter is in common use, however "crumb" is generally an esoteric term used mainly by professionals.

Usage

Bread can be served ranging anywhere from room temperature to hot. Once baked, bread can subsequently be toasted. Bread is most commonly picked up and eaten with the hands, or sometimes with a fork and knife. It can be eaten by itself or as a carrier for another, usually less compact food. Bread may be dunked or dipped into a liquid (such as beef gravy or olive oil), topped with various spreads, both sweet and savory, or serve as the enclosure for the ubiquitous sandwich with any number of meats, cheeses, vegetables or condiments inside. Across the world, bread is the preferred vehicle for many toppings that vary from culture to culture.

Etymology

The word itself, Old English bread, is common in various forms to many Germanic languages; such as Frisian brea, Dutch brood, German Brot, Swedish bröd, and Norwegian brød; it has been claimed to be derived from the root of brew, but more probably is connected with the root of break, for its early uses are confined to broken pieces, or bits of bread, the Latin crustum, and it was not until the 12th century that it took the place—as the generic name for bread—of hlaf (modern English loaf), which appears to be the oldest Teutonic name; Old High German hleib and modern German Laib, or Finnish leipä, Estonian leib, and Russian хлеб (khleb) are similar (all are derived from Old Germanic).

History

Bread is one of the oldest prepared foods, dating back to the Neolithic era. The first breads produced were probably cooked versions of a grain-paste, made from ground cereal grains and water, and may have been developed by accidental cooking or deliberate experimentation with water and grain flour. Descendants of these early breads are still commonly made from various grains worldwide, including the Mexican tortilla, Indian and Pakistani chapatis, rotis and naans, Scottish oatcake, North American johnnycake, Middle Eastern Pita bread (Kmaj in Arabic and Pitot in Hebrew) and Ethiopian injera. The basic flat breads of this type also formed a staple in the diet of many early civilizations with the Sumerians eating a type of barley flat cake, and the 12th century BC Egyptians being able to purchase a flat bread called ta from stalls in the village streets.^[1]

The development of leavened bread can probably also be traced to prehistoric times. Yeast spores occur everywhere, including the surface of cereal grains, so any dough left to rest will become naturally leavened. Although leavening is likely of prehistoric origin, the earliest archaeological evidence is from ancient Egypt. Scanning electron microscopy has detected yeast cells in some ancient Egyptian loaves. However, ancient Egyptian bread was made from emmer wheat and has a dense crumb. In cases where yeast cells are not visible, it is difficult, by visual examination, to determine whether the bread was leavened. As a result, the extent to which bread was leavened in ancient Egypt remains uncertain.^[2]

There were multiple sources of leavening available for early bread. Airborne yeasts could be harnessed by leaving uncooked dough exposed to air for some time before cooking. Pliny the Elder reported that the Gauls and Iberians used the foam skimmed from beer to produce "a lighter kind of bread than other peoples." Parts of the ancient world that drank wine instead of beer used a paste composed of grape juice and flour that was allowed to begin fermenting, or wheat bran steeped in wine, as a source for yeast. The most common source of leavening however was to retain a piece of dough from the previous day to utilize as a form of sourdough starter.^[3]

Even within antiquity there was a wide variety of breads available. In the Deipnosophistae, the Greek author Athenaeus describes some of the breads, cakes, cookies, and pastries available in the Classical world. Among the breads mentioned are griddle cakes, honey-and-oil bread, mushroom shaped loaves covered in poppy seeds, and the military specialty of rolls baked on a spit. The type and quality of flour used to produce bread could also vary as noted by Diphilus when he declared "bread made of wheat, as compared with that made of barley, is more nourishing, more digestible, and in every way superior." In order of merit, the bread made from refined [thoroughly sieved] flour comes first, after that bread from ordinary wheat, and then the unbolted, made of flour that has not been sifted."^[4]

Within medieval Europe bread served not only as a staple food but also as part of the table service. In the standard table setting of the day the trencher, a piece of stale bread roughly 6 inches by 4 inches (15 cm by 10 cm), served as an absorbent plate. At the completion of a meal the trencher could then be eaten, given to the poor, or fed to the dogs. It was not until the 15th Century that trenchers made of wood started to replace the bread variety.^[5]

Otto Frederick Rohwedder is considered to be the father of sliced bread. In 1912 Rohwedder started work on inventing a machine that sliced bread, but bakeries were reluctant to use it since they were concerned the sliced bread would go stale. It was not until 1928, when Rohwedder invented a machine that both sliced and wrapped the bread, that sliced bread caught on. A bakery in Chillicothe, Missouri was the first to use this machine to produce sliced bread.

For generations, white bread was considered the preferred bread of the rich while the poor ate dark bread. However, the connotations reversed in the 20th century with dark bread becoming preferred as having superior nutritional value while white bread became associated with lower class ignorance of nutrition.

Another major advance happened in 1961 with the development of the Chorleywood Bread Process which used the intense mechanical working of dough to dramatically reduce the fermentation period and the time taken to produce a loaf. This process is now widely used around the world.

Recently, domestic breadmakers that automate the process of making bread are becoming popular in the home.

Cultural and political importance of bread

As a foodstuff of great historical and contemporary importance, in many cultures bread has a significance beyond mere nutrition. The Lord's Prayer, for example, contains the line 'Give us today our daily bread'; here, 'bread' is commonly understood to mean necessities in general. In Israel the most usual phrase in work related demonstrations is "lehem, avoda" [bread, work], and during the 1950s, the beatnik community used the term bread as a euphemism for money.^{[citation needed]} The word bread is now commonly used around the world in English speaking countries as a synonym for money, in part, derived from the rhyming slang "Bread and honey". The cultural importance of 'bread' goes beyond slang, however, to serve as a metaphor for basic necessities and living conditions in general. A 'bread-winner' is a household's main economic contributor and has little to do with actual bread-provision, for example. In the USSR, Lenin and his fellow Bolsheviks promised "Peace, Land, and Bread," which thereby became a mainstay slogan of Soviet propaganda. In Newfoundland, bread was seen as having the power to protect against fairies. The term "bread-basket" is often used to denote an agriculturally productive region.

The political significance of bread is considerable. In Britain in the nineteenth century the inflated price of bread due to the Corn Laws caused major political and social divisions, and was central to debates over free trade and protectionism. The Assize of Bread and Ale in the thirteenth century showed the importance of bread in medieval times by setting heavy punishments for short-changing bakers, and bread appeared in Magna Carta a century later.

Types

Bread is a popular food in Western and most other societies, although East Asian societies typically prefer rice or noodles. It is often made from a wheat-flour dough that is cultured with yeast, allowed to rise, and finally baked in an oven. Owing to its high levels of gluten (which give the dough sponginess and elasticity), common wheat (also known as bread wheat) is the most common grain used for the preparation of bread, but bread is also made from the flour of other wheat species (including durum, spelt and emmer), rye, barley, maize (or corn), and oats, usually, but not always, in combination with wheat flour. Although common wheat is best suited for making highly-risen white bread, other wheat species are capable of giving a good crumb. Spelt bread (Dinkelbrot) continues to be widely consumed in Germany, and emmer bread was a staple food in ancient Egypt.

European sweetbread (strucla)	Four loaves	French bread	Breads and Bread Rolls at a bakery
Tin Vienna Bread	Bread in a traditional oven	Pre-sliced bread	Bread rolls
Pain aux noix (nut bread)	A cereal grain	An Indian/Pakistani form of flatbread- Roti