Strange how memories from early life return as you age. Short-term ones would be nice, and are actually more important, day to day, but those long-term ones from so long ago keep on thrusting themselves forward.
These days after the advent of computers, iPads, smartphones, internet, and the World Wide Web, things have changed so radically in present lives that you almost long for a break from it all. It isn’t just those tech things that have altered life, so that it’s almost unrecognizable. It’s what has followed. |
My alternative...
It’s not that easy these days. People are struggling to afford feeding their families, or even themselves in many instances. Greedy landlords, voracious CEOs of major companies, all do their level best to ensure corporate profits remain astoundingly high, while they are also seemingly unable to think about the pain of so many folks these days.
This is not the first time people have suffered from a shortage of, or inferior quality in their bread. Bakers used to grind their own flour, and they were heavy loaves, but nothing had been taken out or added in. Bread was indeed “the staff of life” and kept people healthy, with the addition of simple unprocessed foods.
Faster isn’t always an improvement
Have you ever wondered why, if you read the list of ingredients on flour, vitamins are added? The answer is that the new and improved method of making bread in gigantic factories and supermarkets actually removes the nutrients that we expect to find in our bread.
This coincides with the global health problems that societies face today. In an effort to replace the missing nutrients extracted with the modern bread-making methods they, plus dozens of other “improvers” and additives must be carefully weighed out and added back to the “no fermenting” time of the dough. This is by order of governments who realized health problems were escalating quickly.
The baking that follows is quick. No messing around.
After the 10 weeks that my little “whole-wheat” loaf has sat on my kitchen counter I looked at it again today. No change. Still soft, nice texture. Still brown, perfectly baked. Still smells okay. No mould to be seen. I’m wondering how long the supermarket bread is classified as being “fresh” after baking? Lots of folks buy it.
Should I do the taste test? I’m tempted, purely from a research point of view.
All good!
I didn’t get sick. I felt fine. But I have to wonder if I’d feel the same on a steady daily diet of it?
It’s always worthwhile to look at the labeling of food these days. But know that in modern, speedy baking many of the ingredients simply don’t have to end up on those labels.
It all started with Chorleywood…