Dough made of wheat meal requires a hotter oven than that made of fine flour; and it needs to remain in the oven longer. Indeed, it is a general fault of bread of every description, made in this country, that it is not sufficiently baked. Multitudes eat their bread hot and smoking from the oven in a half-cooked state; and very few seem to think there is any impropriety in doing so. But they who would have their bread good, not only a few hours after it comes from the oven, but as long as it can be kept, must see that it is thoroughly baked.
I have said that the process of vinous fermentation converts a portion of the saccharine matter of the meal into carbonic acid gas or air, by which means the dough is raised and made light; and that the same process converts a portion of the saccharine matter into alcohol. The alcohol thus generated is mostly if not entirely driven off by the heat of the oven when the dough is baking;—and in modern times, ovens have been so constructed in England, as to serve the double purpose of ovens and stills; so that while the bread is baking, the alcohol is distilled off and condensed, and saved for the various uses of arts and manufacture.
The question has, however, been frequently started, whether a portion of the alcohol thus generated, is not contained in the bread when it comes from the oven.
This question cannot be answered with entire certainty; but there are some facts in relation to it of considerable importance.
It is perfectly certain that if two portions of wheat meal or flour be taken from the same barrel or sack, and one portion be made into unleavened bread, and the other portion be made into the very best fermented or raised bread, and both be eaten as soon as they are baked, the fermented bread will digest with more difficulty, and oppress and disturb the stomach more than the unleavened bread will. Indeed it is well known and very generally understood, that few of the articles which compose the food of man in civic life, are so trying to the human stomach, and so powerful causes of dyspepsia, as fresh-baked raised bread.
It is now well known also that alcohol wholly resists the action of the solvent fluid of the stomach, and is entirely indigestible; and always retards the digestion of those substances which contain it. How far all this may be true of carbonic acid gas, is not yet ascertained; but it is difficult to account for the difference between leavened and unleavened bread, as above stated, without supposing that the alcohol or carbonic acid gas, or both of them, are in some degree concerned in rendering the leavened bread, when newly baked, peculiarly oppressive and injurious to the stomach.
This, be it remembered, is purely a conjecture of my own; and I am not entirely certain that it is correct; but I see no other way of meeting the difficulty.
Be it as it may, however, it is very certain that when the bread has been drawn from the oven, and permitted to stand in a proper place twenty-four hours, either by evaporation or some other means, it becomes perfectly matured, and so changed in character, that it is, if properly made, one of the most wholesome articles entering into the diet of man; and at that age, there is not the slightest reason to believe that a particle of alcohol remains in the bread.
When therefore the bread is thoroughly baked, let it be taken from the oven and placed on a perfectly clean and sweet shelf, in a perfectly clean and well ventilated pantry. Do not, as you value the character of your bread, put it into a pantry where you set away dishes of cold meat, cold potatoes, and other vegetables, and keep your butter, cheese and various other table provisions—in a pantry which perhaps is seldom thoroughly cleansed with hot water and soap, and where the pure air of heaven seldom if ever has a free circulation. The quality of your bread should be of too much importance to allow of such reprehensible carelessness, not to say sluttishness. And if you will have your bread such as every one ought to desire to have it, you must pay the strictest attention to the cleanliness and sweetness of the place where you keep it.
If in baking, the outer crust should become a little too dry and crispy, you can easily remedy this by throwing a clean bread or table cloth over it for a short time when it first comes from the oven; but if this is not necessary, let the bread stand on an airy shelf, till it becomes perfectly cool, and when it is twenty-four hours old, it is fit for use; and if it is in all respects properly made, and properly kept, it will continue to be sweet and delicious bread for two or even three weeks, except perhaps in very hot and sultry weather.