Bread should be baked in a quick oven to begin with. The
oven should not be so hot as to burn the outside of the loaf before
the inside is cooked, but should be of such a temperature that the
bread may rise for the first ten minutes, and then have sufficient
crust to hold it up, when the fire should be closed up to hold a
steady heat until the bread is done. For the small loaves, forty
to forty-five minutes is generally sufficient; for the larger ones or
those of ordinary size, one hour to an hour and a quarter. A well
baked loaf may be lifted from the pan and placed upon the palm
of the hand without burning it. This should always be the case
when bread is well baked and the moisture evaporated. When
done, remove from the pans and lay on the side on a wire rack
to cool. If brushed over the top with warm water just after it
is taken out of the oven, the crust of the bread will keep softer,
and will have a nice color.
It is well to remember that when yeast bread is set warm, it
must be kept warm throughout the rising, as, if it becomes chilled
after it begins to work, it will be "sickly," and is likely to sour.
When a sponge or dough is set at night, it should always be set
102
SCIENCE of FOOD ancf COOKERY
with cold water, about 65° or 70°, or about the r temperature of
the room. Bread set at night, furthermore, requires only half as
much yeast as is used for bread set during the day. Night bread
is usually set with a sponge, the amount of flour used being about
the same by measure as that of the liquid. By morning, it will
be lively, and when mixed into a dough, will rise very quickly
without any warming.
As a general rule, with the best quality of white flour, three
measures of flour to one of water are required to make a dough
of the proper consistency. For making entire wheat or Graham
bread, less flour is used in proportion.
YEASTS
Yeasts belong to the fungi, one of the lowest order of non-
flowering plants, without leaves or stems. Like all other plants,
they require warmth, moisture, and food in order to grow ; and
when properly supplied with these, they multiply rapidly.
Pasteur found, by experimentation, that when yeast from fresh
grape juice was watched under the microscope,2 "two cellules had
furnished eight, including the two mother cells, in the course of
two hours." Fermentation proceeds slowly at a temperature 50° F. ;
but from seventy to ninety degrees, it grows rapidly. Fermenta-
tion may be arrested by the exhaustion of either the fermenting
agent (yeast) or the food supply (starch or sugar), or by ex-
posure to heat at the temperature of boiling water. When not
well nourished, the yeast cells begin to break up and die, and
finally decompose with an offensive odor.
Yeast converts sugar into alcohol, carbon dioxide, and other
products of fermentation; and it is believed that leavened bread
owes its flavor largely to these organic substances. Dried yeast
cakes are made by mixing about 20% starch with the yeast for
the purpose of keeping it. Pure yeast (washed and pressed into
cakes, as compressed yeast) will keep for weeks in a cold place,
such as an ice box; but it will spoil in a few days at best if not
kept cold. In the making of all the homemade liquid yeasts,
essentially the same principles are involved, — the introduction of
2 "Leavening Agents," by Hart.
103
Page 57
Presented as published in 1921. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
Bread should be baked in a quick oven to begin with. The oven should not be so hot as to burn the outside of the loaf before the inside is cooked, but should be of such a temperature that the bread may rise for the first ten minutes, and then have sufficient crust to hold it up, when the fire should be closed up to hold a steady heat until the bread is done. For the small loaves, forty to forty-five minutes is generally sufficient; for the larger ones or those of ordinary size, one hour to an hour and a quarter. A well baked loaf may be lifted from the pan and placed upon the palm of the hand without burning it. This should always be the case when bread is well baked and the moisture evaporated. When done, remove from the pans and lay on the side on a wire rack to cool. If brushed over the top with warm water just after it is taken out of the oven, the crust of the bread will keep softer, and will have a nice color.
It is well to remember that when yeast bread is set warm, it must be kept warm throughout the rising, as, if it becomes chilled after it begins to work, it will be "sickly," and is likely to sour. When a sponge or dough is set at night, it should always be set
with cold water, about 65° or 70°, or about the r temperature of the room. Bread set at night, furthermore, requires only half as much yeast as is used for bread set during the day. Night bread is usually set with a sponge, the amount of flour used being about the same by measure as that of the liquid. By morning, it will be lively, and when mixed into a dough, will rise very quickly without any warming.
As a general rule, with the best quality of white flour, three measures of flour to one of water are required to make a dough of the proper consistency. For making entire wheat or Graham bread, less flour is used in proportion.
YEASTS
Yeasts belong to the fungi, one of the lowest order of nonflowering plants, without leaves or stems. Like all other plants, they require warmth, moisture, and food in order to grow ; and when properly supplied with these, they multiply rapidly.
Pasteur found, by experimentation, that when yeast from fresh grape juice was watched under the microscope,[illustration: footnote 2] "two cellules had furnished eight, including the two mother cells, in the course of two hours." Fermentation proceeds slowly at a temperature 50° F. ; but from seventy to ninety degrees, it grows rapidly. Fermentation may be arrested by the exhaustion of either the fermenting agent (yeast) or the food supply (starch or sugar), or by exposure to heat at the temperature of boiling water. When not well nourished, the yeast cells begin to break up and die, and finally decompose with an offensive odor.
Yeast converts sugar into alcohol, carbon dioxide, and other products of fermentation; and it is believed that leavened bread owes its flavor largely to these organic substances. Dried yeast cakes are made by mixing about 20% starch with the yeast for the purpose of keeping it. Pure yeast (washed and pressed into cakes, as compressed yeast) will keep for weeks in a cold place, such as an ice box; but it will spoil in a few days at best if not kept cold. In the making of all the homemade liquid yeasts, essentially the same principles are involved, — the introduction of
[illustration: footnote 2: "Leavening Agents," by Hart.]