Bread gets dry after a while, and is inferior in quality and taste. The lighter the bread the better, although many do not think so. The belief may come from the fact that the lighter bread is the more porous, and therefore the quicker it evaporates and loses its taste. Warm bread, besides being injurious to the teeth, is difficult of digestion. When perfectly cold, let it stand in a dry place, neither cold nor warm, for one or two hours, and use. We give below the best methods of making bread—French bread, or rather good light bread, for we do not see that it is more French than Chinese or American, as long as it can be made everywhere with good flour; it is certainly the best for inhabitants of a large city, and especially for those having a sedentary occupation. Let us apply the proverb to bread as well as to every thing else: "Feed me with food convenient for me."—Bible.
Mix well together one gill of good strong yeast with half a pound of flour, so that it makes a rather stiff paste. Knead so that you shape it like a ball. Make two cuts with a knife on the top, across and about one-quarter of an inch deep; then place the paste in a bowl of tepid water (milk-warm), the cuts upward. After it has been in the water for a few minutes it will float and swell; let it float about two minutes, when take off and use. Put six ounces of flour on the paste-board, and make a hole in the middle; put into it the yeast prepared as above, tepid water enough to make an ordinary dough, and salt to taste. Knead well, shape according to fancy, put in a warm place (about 78 deg. Fahr.) to rise, and bake. It requires about six hours to rise.
Another.—Wash and clean thoroughly half a pound of potatoes, and then steam them with the skins on. Mash them well with half a pint of flour, about half a pint of tepid water, and half an ounce of salt. When thoroughly mixed, put away in a warm place (about 78 deg. Fahr.) for one hour. Then add and mix with it half a pint of good yeast, and put away in the same place for about nine hours. It may take a little longer than nine hours or a little less, but it is very easy to know, and in this way: after a while it will rise slowly and gradually for some time, and then begin to fall; as soon as it begins to fall, mix a little tepid water with it and strain through a sieve; throw away potato skins and eyes; mix what is strained with two pounds of flour and tepid water enough to make an ordinary dough. Put it away again in the same place until it cracks on the top, which will take place in about an hour. Then put six pounds of flour on the paste-board, and make a hole in the middle; put into it a little tepid water and the dough when cracked; knead the whole well with water enough to make an ordinary dough, salt to taste. To knead it well, it is necessary to raise the dough or part of it, and then throw it back on the paste-board with force. The more the dough is kneaded, the better and lighter the bread. Then shape the loaves, let rise, and bake in a very quick oven.
To shape.—Divide the dough, as soon as kneaded, in as many parts as you wish to make loaves; then knead each part, one after another, so as to make a kind of ball; then, by rolling and pulling it, give it an elongated, sausage-like shape. A pound loaf can be made a foot and a half long, as well as four inches; it will only be narrower and thinner, and will have more crust. When the dough is thus elongated, take a round stick or a small rolling-pin, place it on the top of the dough, right on the middle, lengthwise, and then press on it and roll just a little, to and fro, so as to make a kind of furrow in the middle. Have a towel well dusted with flour, place the dough on it upside down, that is, the furrowed side under; let rise as ordinary bread; turn it into a pan, but so that the furrowed side will be up (the side that was down in rising must be up in baking); dust the furrow well with rye-flour to prevent the paste from closing, so that the top of the loaf will be concave instead of convex when baked.
Another.—Steam half a pound of potatoes and mash them well; then mix them immediately and while hot with about a pint of flour, a quart of water, and half a pint of good strong yeast. Leave the mixture six hours in a rather warm place, then strain through a sieve, pressing the potato-skins so as to squeeze all the liquid out of them. Immediately add to the strained mixture flour enough to make ordinary dough, which you knead a little, and let stand as it is from one to two hours and a half, according to temperature. Knead then with it about six pounds of flour, salt to taste, and tepid water to make ordinary dough, and leave it thus two hours, then shape in the same way as the above; put it to rise in the same way also (it will take from one to two hours, according to temperature); dust with rye-flour, and bake.
French bread may be shaped like other bread, round or square; it is just as good.
Rolls, or rather French rolls as they are generally called, are made, shaped, and baked in the same way.
It is a mistake to call bread certain mixtures of flour, soda, and milk; or flour, milk, and butter, etc.; it is no more bread than a mixture of carbonic acid, water, alcohol, molasses, vitriol, etc., is wine. No one can give a name to such a mixture except chemists.