When good flour is found, notice the brand, and seek the same next time. It is sometimes the case, however, that bad flour is passed off, by putting on the brands of persons who have gained a name as makers of superior flour. The only sure way is to try a small sample, and then get a larger supply, if it is good, from the same stock.
Grown wheat makes dough that is runny, and cannot be well moulded, or make good bread. This can be discovered only by trial. Smutty wheat makes flour that is very unhealthful.
Flour always should be sifted before using it, to restore the lightness destroyed by packing, as well as to remove impurities. Bread is also more sure to be light, if the flour is heated before wetting. This can be done, by setting the kneading trough aslant before the fire, stirring it a little as it is warming. When bread proves to be bad, examine the yeast, and see also whether the oven bakes properly. If both are as they should be, and the bread is still poor, then the fault is in the flour, and it should be sent back and another supply obtained. And in buying flour, this liberty should always be secured, even if a higher price is the condition. No economy is so false as to try to save by means of bad bread. Medicine and doctors’ bills soon show the folly of it.
Good yeast is as indispensable to good bread as good flour. Of the receipts given in this book, the one which will keep a month is the best. The one which is made with fewer materials will not keep so well, but is more easily made.
In hot weather, when it is difficult to keep yeast, the hard yeast will be a great convenience. Some housekeepers who have tried both, prefer the flour hard yeast to that which is made with Indian meal, as it does not turn sour, as Indian does. Home-brewed yeast must be used for hard yeast, and not distillery or brewer’s. Yeast, when it is good, is all in a foam, or else has large beads on the surface, and its smell is brisk and pungent, but not sour. When poor, it sometimes smells sour, sometimes looks watery, and the sediment sinks to the bottom, and it has no froth or beads. Sometimes, when yeast does not look very good, it is improved by adding a tea-cup, or so, of flour, and two or three great spoonfuls of molasses, and setting it in a warm place to rise. Yeast must be kept in stone, or glass, with a tight cork, and the thing in which it is kept should often be scalded, and then warm water with a half teaspoonful of saleratus be put in it, to stand a while. Then rinse it with cold water. Sour yeast cannot be made good by saleratus.
The last grand essential to good bread is good care. Unless the cook can be fully trusted, the mistress of a family must take this care upon herself. She must, if needful, stand by and see that the bread is wet right, that the yeast is good, that the bread is put where it is warm enough, that it does not rise too long, so as to lose its sweetness (which is often the case before it begins to turn sour), that it is moulded aright, that the oven is at the right heat, and that it is taken out at the right time, and then that it is put in the right place, and not set flat on to a greasy table, or painted shelf, to imbibe a bad taste.
Perhaps it may be thought that all this is a great drudgery, but it is worse drudgery to have sickly children, and a peevish husband, made so by having all the nerves of their stomachs rasped with sour, or heavy bread. A woman should be ashamed to have poor bread, far more so, than to speak bad grammar, or to have a dress out of the fashion. It is true, that, by accident, the best of housekeepers will now and then have poor bread, but then it is an accident, and one that rarely happens. When it is very frequently the case that a housekeeper has poor bread, she may set herself down as a slack baked and negligent housekeeper.
It is very desirable that every family should have a constant supply of bread made of unbolted flour, or of rye and Indian. Most persons like to eat of it occasionally, and it tends to promote health. Warm cakes also, made of unbolted flour, are very excellent, and serviceable to health. The receipts for these articles in this work are first-rate. Warm raised bread cakes, of fine wheat, are not so healthy for breakfast, as those made of unbolted flour, Indian meal, rice, or tapioca. Griddle cakes, muffins, and waffles, made of these last articles, are more healthful than those made of fine wheat. If eaten at the right temperature (not above blood heat), and with but little butter, they are safe and harmless. Unbolted flour is good in almost any receipt in which fine flour is to be used, and many very much prefer it for all kinds of warm cakes. Brown bread, when light, makes good drop cakes, or good griddle cakes, by adding a little water or milk, and some eggs, and in some cases, a spoonful or two of molasses. Many cases are on record, of great changes for the better, in the health of individuals and communities, by the habitual use of food made of unbolted flour.
The style in which bread is prepared for the table, is a matter to be carefully attended to. In moulding up loaves and small cakes, do not leave lumps and loose flour adhering to the outside, but work them in thoroughly, so as to have the cake look fair and smooth. Wipe off flour from the outside before carrying to the table. Buttered pans are better than floured ones, because the cakes cleave off cleaner. When soda and saleratus are used, work it in thoroughly, or you will have those yellow spots and streaks, which look so disgusting, and show a slovenly negligence.
In the receipts for making bread, no particular direction is given in regard to the time bread should stand after it is moulded and put in pans, because here is the point where observation and discretion are so indispensable, and rules are unavailing without. In hot weather, when the yeast is very good, and the bread very light, it must not stand over fifteen minutes after it is moulded, before setting in. If it is cold weather, and the yeast is less active, or the bread not perfectly raised, it may sometimes stand an hour in the pans without injury.