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Classic
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page 212
which flavors the bread and makes it disagreeable. A poor, thin yeast produces
an imperfect fermentation, the result being a heavy unwholesome loaf.
If either the sponge or the dough be permitted to overwork itself--that is to
say, if the mixing and kneading be neglected when it has reached the proper
point for either--sour bread will probably be the consequence in warm weather,
and bad bread in any. The goodness will also be endangered by placing it so near
a fire as to make any part of it hot, instead of maintaining the gentle and
equal degree of heat required for its due fermentation.
Heavy bread will also most likely be the result of making the dough very hard,
and letting it become quite cold, particularly in winter.
An almost certain way of spoiling dough is to leave it half-made, and to allow
it to become cold before it is finished. The other most common causes of failure
are using yeast which is no longer sweet, or which has been frozen, or has had
hot liquid poured over it.
As a general rule, the oven for baking bread should be rather quick, and the
heat so regulated as to penetrate the dough without hardening the outside. The
oven-door should not be opened after the bread is put in until the dough is set
or has become firm, as the cool air admitted will have an unfavorable effect on
it.
The dough should rise and the bread begin to brown after about fifteen minutes,
but only slightly. Bake from fifty to sixty minutes, and have it brown, not
black or whitey brown, but brown all over when well baked.
When the bread is baked, remove the loaves immediately from the pans, and place
them where the air will circulate freely around them and thus carry off the gas
which has been formed, but is no longer needed.
Never leave the bread in the pan or on a pine table to absorb the odor of the
wood. If you like crusts that are crisp do not cover the loaves; but to give the
soft, tender, wafer-like consistency which many prefer, wrap them, while still
hot, in several thicknesses of bread-cloth. When cold put them in a stone jar,
removing the cloth, as that absorbs the moisture and gives the bread an
unpleasant taste and odor. Keep the jar well covered, and carefully cleansed
from crumbs and stale pieces. Scald and dry it thoroughly every two or three
days. A yard and a half square of coarse table linen makes the best bread-cloth.
Keep in good supply; use them for no other purpose.
Some people use scalding water in making wheat bread; in that case the flour
must be scalded and allowed to cool before the yeast is added,--then proceed as
above. Bread made in this manner keeps moist in summer, much longer than when
made in the usual mode.
Home-made yeast is generally preferred to any other. Compressed yeast, as
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