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Bread Quotes

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Bread Quotes

“What makes good bread? It is a question of good flour and slow fermentation. In the old days we used to leave the dough to ferment for at least three or four hours, and it wasn't necessary to put chemicals into the dough. Today the farmers get much bigger crops from the same piece of ground, but the wheat has lost its taste. And to make it look nice and white — comme un cadavre — the millers grind it up fine and sift it, so you are left with very little except starch.”

“It was while here that I got my first lessons in baking bread in the ground. The method was this: A shallow hole was dug in the sand and a fire lighted in it and allowed to burn out, thoroughly heating the ground all around it. While the ground was being heated, bread was made of sour dough, put between two gold-pans, and allowed to rise. Then the hot ashes and dirt were scooped out of the hole and the gold pans put in and covered with ashes and hot sand. The bread was allowed to stay in about an hour: if left in too long it wouldn’t burn, but the crust would get thicker. The loaf came out a rich golden brown and very delicious. This of course was only done when conditions were favorable.”

“I will never be someone who gives up wheat or grains (give me gluten or give me death), but I'm surprised at how delicious the nut-and-seed-based bread is and how much of that is down to Natasha's guidance. Unlike with most of the recipes, she had a lot of specific instructions with this one ("Almonds and hazelnuts, coconut oil, and a mix of seeds---try sunflower, pumpkin and sesame. Maybe some flax. A little honey as well, but no more than a tablespoon").”

“I love the caraway seeds in the classic rye bread, but I wonder if the rich dough might not also hold up to other flavors. I jot down some notes. Aniseed. Fennel seed. Orange zest. Golden raisins. Coarse salt? Maybe if Herman doesn't come down when I am working on the dough, I can use a small batch for a little experiment. I'm thinking rolls, not loaves. The kind of rolls you want to smear with cold sweet butter at dinner, or split and toast and spread with cream cheese for breakfast. Savory and sweet. Maybe semolina on the bottom instead of the coarser cornmeal we use for the regular rye loaves.”

“I was nineteen at the time, and like any other besotted teenage girl, I was desperately eager to please the object of my affections. I didn’t argue the point, but set to work producing the desired loaf. The result was barely chewable when it emerged hot from the oven. By the time it cooled, it seemed significantly more resistant to fire, flood, or earthquakes than my dormitory’s concrete walls. After a brief discussion, Gabriel and I both decided that this rye-brick was more appropriate food for crows than for humans. I carried the slab to the balcony of my eighth-floor dormitory apartment, expecting that a fall from that height would smash it to crumbs. I peered over the edge to make sure no one was below me; I didn’t want to drop the hardened mass onto someone’s head and make a murderess of myself. After verifying that the concrete walkway below was clear, I dropped the rye-brick over the side of the balcony. Down, down, it plummeted—past the seventh floor, the sixth, the fifth … Nearly a hundred feet below, and traveling somewhere around eighty feet per second, the rye-brick finally hit the ground—and didn’t break. Despite an eight-story drop onto concrete, the rye-brick maintained its integrity. One of my roommates inspected the situation and expressed surprise that the stones of the walkway itself remained unscathed. I didn’t try making any wheat-free loaves for a while after that.”

“I grab the nonstick skillet, put it on the stove, and fetch four slices of bread from the breadbox. I've been playing with a new bread recipe, a cross between sourdough and English muffin, baked in a sliceable loaf. Makes fantastic toast, and I've been craving grilled cheese with it since I brought it home yesterday. I literally butter all four slices all the way to each edge, place them butter-side down in the skillet, and top each with a thick slice of American cheese. That way, as the pan slowly heats up, the cheese starts to melt, and by the time the outsides are crunchy and crispy, the cheese is a goo-fest, and nothing gets burnt. And I always make two, because one grilled cheese sandwich is never enough.”

“Bubbles enters with a plate overflowing with rugelach. The three of us fall silent as we indulge in the small snail-shaped pastries of tender cream-cheese-infused dough wrapped around various fillings: one with walnuts and cinnamon, one bursting with chocolate, one with a thick, sweet poppy seed paste, and one with apricot jam that has been bumped up with some chewy bits of diced dried apricots.”

“But then Oma tells me of bread, of the six hundred kinds made throughout her homeland, white and gray and black in color. Loaves heavy with pumpkin seeds. Pumpernickel. Rye. All with long, dense names like 'Sonnenblumenkernbrot' and 'Roggenmischbrot'. Each word is music to her. She has never eaten a tinned bread bagged in plastic with a little twist tie, a pride she wears all over. 'It matters,' she tells me. 'Wes Brot ich ess, des Lied ich sing.' Whose bread I eat, his song I sing.”

“Christstollen. I can shake away thoughts of favorite gifts and trips to Oma's house and building snowmen with Santa hats every Christmas Eve, as long as enough snow covered the ground. But my mother's stollen won't fall off as easily. She made it for my father; he ate the first piece with cream cheese at breakfast while I had bacon and chocolate chip pancakes and my mother drank her special amaretto tea. The recipe is there, tucked in her recipe box, the index card translucent in places from butter stains. I hold it in my hand, considering, reading the ingredients and pawing through the cupboards and pantry. We have raisins and a bag of dried cranberries from last year's Christmas baking. There's a wrinkled orange in the fruit bin, a couple plastic packets of lemon juice that came with one of my father's fish and chips take-out orders. No marzipan, almonds, candied fruit, or mace. I'll be up all night. It's too much effort. But the card won't seem to leave my hand. So I start, soaking the fruit and preparing the sponge.”

“Thin sheets of warm roti and mana'eesh are best for scooping food from plate to mouth like tactile, edible cutlery, but bread is better for sponging up the delicious detritus from the plate. The soft, open crumb swells with cream or curry sauce, gravy or meat juices, to leave us replete. A Chinese host may take a mopped plate as a sign that more food is needed, yet I would rather think of each painterly flourish as a signature, a thank-you note to the cook.”

“The Hebrews come into the bread eaters' land with no bread of their own. It's famine, and Jacob's sons travel to Egypt in hopes of finding something to save their families. They find not only grain but forgiveness. Joseph is there, whom God takes from them so he can later deliver them. They find a new home. And they, too, find the miracle of yeast. Surely the descendants of Abraham bake their grains, mixing flour and oil and kneading it to dough. But this is 'uggah'- a flat cake baked on hot stones or in the ashes, the same given to the Lord by Abraham when he visits and pronounces Isaac's birth. Nomads have no time for fermentation, for waiting for dough to ripen. They have enough to carry from place to place. And they have no ovens, probably have never conceived of such a thing. Again, too heavy to move. So what must it have been like for them to see these risen loaves come from strange Egyptian baking containers? It becomes part of them, the first thing they cry out for in the wilderness, not any bread but that of those who enslaved them. The Hebrews have freedom. Instead, they want food, their bellies filled with the earthly comfort they know. And God, the heavenly Comforter, sends bread of a different kind. 'What is it?' They call it 'manna'. And it's given 'to' the wandering children of Israel, but not only 'for' them. For us. For all who brush away the veil and will one day lay eyes on the true manna, a child they do not yet know will be born in Beth-lehem, the house of bread.”

“It's 10:00 a.m., time for the second round of baking of the day. After feeding the fire with chunks of maple, he loads the bread and pastries according to cooking time: first the fat country rounds, then long, skinny loaves dense with nuts and dried fruit, and finally a dozen purple crescent moons: raspberry croissants pocked with chunks of white chocolate.”

“Suddenly starving, I root around in the fridge to see what I have lying about and find the heel of a meat loaf I made a couple of days ago when Brad mentioned he was craving meat loaf sandwiches. It had suddenly sounded good to me too, so I made a small one for myself. In the breadbox, a couple of slices of the brioche loaf I made last night when I couldn't sleep; a little smear of spicy Korean gochujang paste on the bread; some thinly sliced cucumber salad, a little wilted in its rice-wine brine but still crunchy; and the meat loaf.”

“They walked past offerings displayed on trestle boards and tables... puddings, sliced beef, boiled eggs, paper scoops filled with pickles, olives, salted nuts, or hot green peas glistening with bacon fat. There were roasted potatoes wrapped in waxed paper, crisp slivers of fried fish, smoked oysters crusted with salt, and cones of hardbake sweetmeats or brandy balls. Just a few minutes earlier, Keir had been willing to overlook his hunger in favor of more important concerns. Now that he was surrounded by this profusion of food, however, his empty stomach informed him that nothing else would happen until it was filled. Merritt stopped at a stall featuring sandwiches, bread and butter, and cake. "Evenin', milady," the stallkeeper said with a respectful tip of his hat. "Mr. Gamp," she said warmly. "I've brought this gentleman to try the best ham sandwich in London." "Smoked Hampshire ham, that's the secret," the stallkeeper said proudly as he set out a pasteboard box. "That, and the missus bakes the bread herself. Barm-leavened, to make it soft and sweet.”

“"She can't do Subtraction." said the White Queen. "Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife-what's the answer to that?" "I suppose-" Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen answered for her. "Bread-and-butter, of course."”

“I just think that you have to believe in yourself and you have to work very hard. You can't ever think that you're the best thing since sliced bread because I promise you, there are going to be Viola Davises and Jessica Chastains and Emma Stones who are the best thing since sliced bread. So take it seriously, but don't take it too seriously.”

“He who asks to receive his daily bread does not automatically receive it in its fullness as it is in itself: he receives it according to his own capacity as recipient. The Bread of Life (cf. Jn. 6:35) gives Himself in His love to all who ask, but not in the same way to all; for He gives Himself more fully to those who have performed great acts of righteousness, and in smaller measure to those who have not achieved so much. He gives Himself to each person according to that person's spiritual ability to receive Him.”

“If... Adam had trusted in God and been nourished from the tree of life (Gn. 2:9)? he would not have set aside the immortality that had been granted. For such immortality is eternally preserved by participation in life, since all life is genuine and preserved by appropriate food. The food of that blessed life is 'the bread that came down from heaven and gives life to the world' (Jn. 6:33), just as the inerrant Word Himself declares about Himself in the Gospels.”

“The perfect bacon sandwich is on white bread, very soft and very thick. Sourdough with a good crust. The bacon is half way to being crispy - and there's lots of it - and enough brown sauce to trickle down your arm. You've not really enjoyed a bacon sandwich unless 10 minutes later you're still licking your wrists.”

“I was a devil of a scapegrace in my time.... Father racked his head for days together to find a punishment that I should remember; but it was all no good... bread and water was a welcome change to me from the everyday monotony of potatoes and bread-and-butter. After a sound drubbing followed by half a day’s fasting, I felt more like laughing than like crying; and, in half a while, all was forgotten and my wickedness began afresh and worse than ever.”

“To disbelieve in marriage is easy: to love a married woman is easy; but to betray a comrade, to be disloyal to a host, to break the covenant of bread and salt, is impossible.”

“For many of us, the computer is the means by which we earn a living. To give it a nod, then, is a way of thanking the tool for what it provides in life. It helps put bread on the table and a roof overhead. It gives us work and pleasure, exercises our minds, brings us information, connects us with other people. It is a partner helping us achieve our goals. Nodding also thanks the unseen hands and minds who helped create our machine.”

“I was often humiliated to see men disputing for a piece of bread, just as animals might have done. My feelings on this subject have very much altered since I have been personally exposed to the tortures of hunger. I have discovered, in fact, that a man, whatever may have been his origin, his education, and his habits, is governed, under certain circumstances, much more by his stomach than by his intelligence and his heart.”