Notes - History of Bread

CHAPTER 21 (A): GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD………………

Bread!!! A word of many meanings, a symbol of giving….a symbol of sharing….one food that is common to so many countries…..eaten by millions across the world……….but what really is bread?

The Hungarians have a saying….’bread is older than man’ !!!!

More than 12,000 years ago, primitive people made flat breads by mixing coarsely ground grain

and water and then placing these ‘cakes’ in the sun to bake. Later on, bread was cooked on

heated rocks or in the ashes of a burnt out fire

It was the Egyptians who were credited with using a starter of wild yeast from the air that was kept and mixed with fresh dough and then cooked to create a leavened product. Legend has it that a slave in a royal Egyptian household forgot about some dough that he had set aside. When he returned, it had doubled in size. Trying to hide his mistake, the dough was punched down furiously and baked. The result was a bread, lighter than anyone had tasted. I cannot vouch for the veracity of this anecdote, but it does sound plausible.

The ancient Greeks had over 50 types of bread. Public bakeries and ovens were built by the government for everyone’s use and were popular places to visit the neighbors. The Romans continued with the idea of public bakeries. Even today, villages in the Punjab have community tandoors.

Bread has also found its way into the English language. In American English, the word’s bread and dough are slang for money. A bread winner is one who earns the wage to keep the family going and a bread basket often refers to a geographical region that has the principal grain supply. Have you ever thought about the expression ‘the greatest thing since sliced bread’ !!?? In Arabic, the words for bread and life are similar. The Russian word for Hospitality translates into bread and salt. In Russia again, it is customary to give a round, freshly baked bread to a guest as a sign of respect and honor.

In several countries, bread is closely associated with religion. In the bible alone, there are over 250 references to bread.

There are some interesting stories associated with bread. The Italian Calzone literally means ‘pants legs’ and got its name probably because of its resemblance to the billowy trouser legs favored by Neapolitan men in the 18^th and 19^th century. Anadama bread from the US got its name when a Yankee whose wife Anna was so lazy and uncaring, she left him in the midst of preparing corn meal mush. That, with a pitcher of molasses was all she had for supper. Angrily, the husband tossed the mush and molasses together, swore at his wife, and baked it as bread ….it was delicious!!!! Sally Lunn is a very rich, sponge like ‘cake’ made in a deep pan. Sally Lunn was said to sell cakes in Bath in England in the 18^th century. Sally Lunn could also have been a corruption of Soleil et Lune, the French for sun and moon.

Rum Babas were said to have gotten their name when the Polish king Stanislas Leszcynski was exiled to Lorraine in France. He found the local Kugelhopf too dry for his liking and dipped the bread in rum. So enchanted was he with his creation, the king named the dish after his favorite character from A Thousand and One Nights, Ali Baba. Later, his chef refined the sweet bread by using brioche dough. Another source notes that in Russia, baba means granny and that those rum soaked cakes, made in tapering moulds, resemble old-fashioned skirts!!!!

At least three explanations exist for the origin of pannetone, an egg and butter rich cylindrical loaf that dates back to the 15^th century. Pannet was thought to be a bread eaten daily, so this special bread was called pannetone. Also pan di tono, a rich and fancy bread was made , even by the poor at Christmas time. The third story centers around Tony, a baker, who was given all the ingredients he needed for the ultimate loaf of bread by a nobleman in exchange for the bakers daughter. The bread was therefore called pan-di-tonio or Ton’s bread.

Stories of wars being won or lost and favors being granted by the barter of freshly baked bread are common. At one time, French soldiers demanded white bread to give them courage. Greek women are said to have tucked a piece of bread into their husbands/sons tunic when they set off to war.

Bakers in local communities celebrated political victories or ‘saved a country by introducing a specific shape or type of bread. The crescent shaped croissant originated in Hungary in 1686, when the Turks attempted to besiege the city at night through underground passages. Bakers who worked through the night, heard the invaders and raised the alarm in time to save their city. Afterwards, they fashioned bread and pastries in the shape of crescents on the Ottoman flag to celebrate the victory. History records that Colomba di pasqua (shaped like a dove and often now made for Easter) is said to have been created in Spain by bakers following the appearance of two heaven-sent doves that miraculously appeared after the defeat of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in the 12^th century.

Necessity was also the mother of invention. Pumpernickle, a German baker was said to have developed a hearty loaf out of rye and with very little wheat flour during a famine sometime around 1450.

In conclusion, I would like to say that be it a baguette or a brioche, a pannetone or a pav…bread is the staff of life…a bond of friendship and it will always be a symbol of that around the world, wherever it comes from. To break it is to share……… to make it is to care !!!!!

Vernon Coelho

Ihm Mumbai

2006-07