Singh Dueep J - Introduction to Yeast Breads: Breads and Bread Pastries

A couple of months ago I wrote a book on breads, and the reader may ask why I would want to continue the topic, about this most integral part of our life, bread, basic bread. Well, everybody knows that throughout the dawn of mans existence, as well as throughout history, bread has been the symbol of an old-time kitchen and hearth which has formed the warm and be the center of a human home.

Ancient tomb carvings depict planting, harvesting the grain, grinding, mixing of the bread and baking it. This head of wheat was considered to be so sacred that it was a decoration on the weapons and shields of great warriors and kings.

Even Gods and goddesses, especially the Greek goddess Demeter whose Egyptian equivalent was the goddess Isis was the goddess of harvesting with wheat as her symbol.

According to the Arabs, wheat and other grains like corn, rye, barley, oats, millet and maize came down from heaven in 7 handkerchiefs and it has always to be respected since Allah himself took so much care to keep these precious cereals, clean and pure, while handing them to man. That is why they call bread, Gods special gift.

So it was only when human beings found out that wheat was one of the grasses which could be kept for a long time without spoiling in dry conditions, they started harvesting, storing and grinding it so that finely bread could be made from it.

The first loaf of bread which was made of flour must have consisted mainly of a coarsely crushed grain mixed with water. And then it would have been cooked, on a flat or convex shape heated strong. Later on, it would have been mixed into a dough, and then baked in an oven or baked in front of a fire.

Some baked bread would have been cooked in the form of flat cakes, and rolled up and stored away for future eating pleasure.

So, you may say, that is all very all right, but what has this to do with yeast bread? Well, millenniums ago, Egyptians discovered that, if the wheat dough was fermented to form gases, the result was a lighter loaf. That was because the gluten present in the wheat enabled the dough to expand and thus retain the gases needed for fermentation. Of course, they did not know the scientific explanation, and the presence of gluten, but they knew all about light loafs of bread.

There are some elements of flour, which, though distinctive from each other in the dry state united upon the addition of moisture in the form of water to form gluten. This gave the soft springy quality to the bread dough. And this was the origin of the soft springy bread as we know it. We are talking about the ancient Egyptians here, who supposedly were the first people who built ovens for bread baking.

However, believe it or not, 10,000 years ago, the people living near hot lakes in Switzerland had their own bake ovens, where the bread was baked on the hot flowing earth near these hot springs.

The character of many homemade breads are going to depend upon the availability of cereal grains and local tradition and taste. That is why there is a wide selection of breads available all over the world, depending on the locality, and the traditions which are being followed down the centuries.

The yeast breads are mainly of wheat flour or whole wheat flour containing the germ of the wheat and the bran in varying quantities. Other flours like barley are also used to make yeast breads.