FoodNetArchive

Scientific cooking with scientific methods

1911

Page 8 · 3 recipe records on this page

Presented as published in 1911. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
In the quick breads we get our ferment from the baking-powder we use, or by beating in a great deal of cold air, which causes the bread to lighten when placed in the hot oven. The object in making the bread light and porous is to have it easily acted upon by the diges- tive ferment with whic"h it comes in contact, first in the mouth, then in the stomach. The starchy foods want to stay a long time in the mouth and be well chewed, to mix them well with the saliva, as digestion should be- gin in the mouth, a fact that makes itself manifest by the sweet taste. When we put a piece of bread in the mouth and chew it for a long time, we taste the sugar; this shows the digestion has begun. Acids found in molasses, sour milk and lemon juice will liberate gas in soda, and this lightens the dough and causes it to become porous. Water Bread. 2 cups boiling water. 2 level teaspoons salt. 1 tablespoon each lard or butter. 1 yeast cake. 1 tablespoon sngar. %, cnp warm water. Flour to make a dough that you knead without its sticking to the hands or boardWater Bread. Put your butter or lard, sugar and salt in the boiling water, in bread mixer or large bowl. Stir until sugar is dissolved and lard and butter melted, then beat in IG SCIENTIFIC COOKING. three cups of flour, ana beat well until the cells in th3 dough are well filled with air. Add dissolved yeast cakes, then enough flour to make the dough stiff to be handled. Care must be taken not to get too much flour. It is hard to give the exact amount of flour, as the quantity will depend upon the kind of flour used. Flour made from the spring wheat is the best for the bread, for the reason there is more gluten in it than we flnd in the pastry flour. Turn your dough on a well-floured board, knead until it becomes smooth and elastic, and well filled with bubbles under the surface. When it is ready to be returned to a well-buttered bowl large enough to allow it to double its bulk, it is then ready to be shaped and put into small buttered bread-pans. Place to rise in a tem- perature of from 68° F. to 70° F., until it has doubled its bulk, when you place it in a hot oven and bake, re- ducing the heat, if necessary, to keep it from burning. A small, brick-shaped loaf will require thirty minutes to bake if the heat in the oven is just right. It is much better to make your bread up in the morn- ing, and put more yeast to lighten it. And do not think the loaf will taste of the yeast; it will not, for experi- ence and the scientist have shown us that it takes just so much yeast to lift the loaf, and if we do not put it in, it has to take the time to gather the spores from the air with the food which w^e have in our mixture. So I can safely say we have quicker and sweeter bread by using plenty of yeast. With the cake of the compressed yeast to each pint of wetting (whether milk or water), the bread will be lifted twice; then allow it to bake three hours. The result will be the sweet,, delicious loaf without the chance of souring. When the bread is well baked, turn on the side on a wire bread-rack, to cool before putting in the bread- BREAD AND BREAD-M.VKING. 17 box, or, better, the stone jar with the stone cover. Do not >\Tap bread in cloths when putting it away, as it will taste of the cloth. Milk Bread. 1 cup scalded milk. 1 teaspoon salt. Milk Bread