Where I come from, most people eat terrible bread. In the 1960’s bread in the United States was industrialized like the rest of the food market; it was transformed to be made as quickly as possible, while still making it bigger, softer, cheaper, and longer lasting. The result? Bad bread. Not only was the taste of this bread subpar, it was filled it enzymes used to replace the process rising bread with yeast. Additives like calcium propionate, amylase, chlorine dioxide and L-cysteine hydrochloride were added to ‘improve’ the bread. Bread now comes to the supermarket pre-sliced, wrapped in plastic, and completely identical. What blows my mind, is that growing up, I thought my family bought good bread! We never ate Wonderbread, we bought the whole grain bread, with oats in it. It tasted similar, but a little coarser. But at the grocery store, it was the ‘good stuff’ of the bread isle.
Now I’m in Iceland, and I’m in a group project where we’re making sourdough bread. I’ve never made bread. I’m full of questions, as always.
“Is it vegan?”
Yes.
“But I thought there were eggs in it?”
Some kinds of bread have them, not sourdough.
“Well, don’t we have to add sugar?”
No.
“How does it get sweet then?”
The flour has some sugars in it, but it won’t really be sweet…
“Wait, it’s just flour and water? What about all the other ingredients?”
Yes, this was my confusion in the bakery, making my first loaf of bread. I grew up seeing a list of ingredients on my bread, and suddenly I’m realizing that the bread I ate through my whole life was a cheap, toxic imitation of what bread should be, what bread always has been. Our first two loaves come out of the oven, and fill our house with the warmest smell. Just flour and water. I felt like an onlooker when Jesus turned water to wine, the moment felt sacred. I’ve discovered a new world, where food can hold the love and patience of the baker, and each loaf has the personality of the mother starter, the mold, the seeds and nuts added. I even learned that the bacteria needed to help the sourdough rise can only be added by the baker’s hands. Bread made by machines needs to add synthesized bacteria, but when humans sink their hands into dough, it rises for us. It’s a symbiotic relationship that I believe should be honored and nurtured. Who ever though we could invent something to replace that?
Nicole Marino
