I seem to really like making bread recently.  After my failed sourdough recipe, I scoured the internet looking for a different recipe to sustain my pour student life style.  The internet literally has billions of different bread recipes.  This makes sense,  because first of all, it's the internet, and secondly, bread is virtually a universal food.  For millenia is has been known as "the Staff of Life."  This energy dense substance can be made from very few ingredients, flour of any sort, water, oil, and some sort of leavening agent is optional.  The French have their Baguettes, Indians have Paratha, Kenyans have Maandazi, and we Americans have good ol' wonder bread.   This past week I've been making white bread with variable success.  The first loaf I made rose beautifully.  The subsequent loaves have had, well, let's just say they've had issues.  Whether it was not rising enough, being too fragile, or going stale in 2 days, none of loaves I have made since the first one have been quite as beautiful.  I still need to do a little research on bread and yeast, and that post will be to come, but let's talk about the culture of American bread.

What's more American than PB&J on white bread?  We all had it packed away in our lunch boxes at some point during elementary school.  Some of us, like me, continued to eat it throughout secondary and post secondary education.  While today white bread is a staple food across classes, this was not always the case.  When milling grain to become flour for white bread, the outer shell (bran) and kernel (germ) are removed leaving only the carbohydrate rich and nutrient deficient endosperm.  Whole wheat on the other hand uses the entire grain which is why it has more fiber (from the bran) and vitamin E, Vitamin B12 and fat (from the germ).  Ancient Egyptians made it a punishable crime to adulterate the flour to make white bread. During the Middle Ages, those who had money would strip their wheat and make soft, pale white bread.  Those who could not afford to waste any part of the wheat made a darker, heartier whole wheat bread. Now, after discovering the health benefits of fiber lost during the milling process of white bread, whole wheat bread has once again become en vogue. 

The modern milling process perfected during the industrial revolution in the late 1800s virtually strips white bread of any nutritional value.  This was a problem during the Great Depression where the majority of the population survived on white flour products (like white bread).  Enter WonderBread. 

WonderBread is made with enriched flour which contains synthesized versions of many of the nutrients lost during the milling process.  This includes niacin, thiamine, riboflavin, iron, some B vitamins, and calcium, lots and lots of calcium.  Incidentally, along with being good for your bones and teeth, it also extends the shelf life of bread.  I won't say that WonderBread saved the United States during the Depression, but enriched flour sure did help Americans in need take in some essential vitamins and minerals while getting their daily dose of carbohydrates.  It might have been the best thing since sliced bread (which incidentally was a WonderBread creation in 1928)!

Today, WonderBread and many other companies continue to make adulterated white bread.  It's cheap, and it's yummy.  So go on America, keep on eating an American classic.  Just make sure you get all your vitamins and minerals too. 

White Bread
Ingredients

2 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
1/3 cup white sugar
1 ½ tablespoons active dry yeast
1 ½ teaspoons salt
¼ cup vegetable oil
6 cups bread flour

Directions

In a large bowl, dissolve the sugar in warm water, and then stir in
yeast. Allow to proof until yeast resembles a creamy foam.

Mix salt and oil into the yeast. Mix in flour one cup at a time. Knead
dough on a lightly floured surface until smooth. Place in a well oiled
bowl, and turn dough to coat. Cover with a damp cloth. Allow to rise
until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Punch dough down. Knead for a few minutes, and divide in half. Shape
into loaves, and place into two well oiled 9x5 inch loaf pans. Allow
to rise for 30 minutes, or until dough has risen 1 inch above pans.
Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 30 minutes.

The first leavened breads ever made were probably close to modern sourdoughs due to the simplicity of the ingredients involved: flour, water, salt, and sugar.  Most scholars agree that Egypt was likely the birthplace of Sourdough bread around 1500 BCE.  Like many of the great discoveries, sourdough was probably created on accident. It is easy to imagine an Egyptian baker walking in to find a pile of his flour wet and fermenting.  My first thoughts probably wouldn’t have been “bread!” but hey, we’re glad his were.  Through time, the process of creating a wild yeast culture for dough has been refined several times.  There is no one correct way to make sourdough.

Over the years, the natural processes that go into creating sourdough have proven extremely reliable.  In fact, when exploring the western United States sourdough was a staple food.  During the California and Klondike Gold Rushes, yeast and baking soda just didn’t cut it as a leavening agents.  Sourdough prevailed feeding the thousands of young men who made that trek.  Perhaps the most famous Sourdough stems from these times.  The Boudin family, from France, came to San Francisco and set up shop during the California Gold Rush.  Their bread fed the miners who worked in the area.  The sourdough they serve today is from the same mother dough they created in 1849. 

Sourdough gets its name from its distinctly sour flavor.  This taste comes from the lactic acid producing bacteria of the genus Lactobacillus.  These bacteria are the same ones that make milk into buttermilk or yogurt.  Each batch of sourdough is unique because it begins with a wild starter.  That is, the bread is started with whatever microbes happened to be on the grain and in the air when the flour is mixed with water.  This is why it is important to use unbleached flour.  Bleaching the flour destroys many of the microbes that might be in flour.  The use of local microbes is what distinguishes a San Francisco sourdough from say a Minneapolis sourdough.  A small portion of the starter is saved each time a new loaf is made to preserve the distinct flavor for every new loaf. 
  
Due to the uncontrollable variables associated with sourdough, it is difficult to get a good tasting starter.  In general, it is necessary to control the acidity of the dough and cultivate a healthy yeast population.  This involves keeping the starter cool after it begins and refreshing the dough by discarding half and feeding it more flour and water.  The yeasts and bacteria feed on the sugars created by amylase enzymes that convert the starch from flour.  Refreshing the dough takes out some of the acid produced from this process.  Furthermore, while feeding the dough, it is important to incorporate some oxygen.  The oxygen helps the yeast build cell membranes for new cells.  If any of the above mentioned things does not happen, a couple things can go wrong.  If you don’t feed the starter, the bacteria and yeast run out of food and die leaving you with a lifeless, flat bread.  If the bacteria grow faster than the yeasts, it inhibits gas production resulting in a very flat, dense loaf of bread.  If the yeast grows faster than the bacteria, you won’t get that distinctly sour flavor.  If the starter is too acidic, the bacterial protein-digesting enzymes weaken the dough gluten which also produces a brick-like piece of dough. 

The recipe I followed was from S. John Ross’s page, http://www.io.com/~sjohn/sour.htm.  Admittedly, mine did not turn out very well.  I couldn’t get it to rise enough and it lacked flavor.  I’m told sourdough starter gets better over time so we’ll see how it goes next week.  I just need to makes sure I tend well to my starter and keep it happy.

Tabouli is a salad dish commonly associated with eastern Mediterranean cuisine made primarily of bulgar wheat.  Tabouli stems from the Levant region of western Asia; this includes Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Northern Iraq, and Southern Turkey.  Due to the lucrative trade that passed through this region during the rise and height of the Ottoman empire, this dish has spread to much of the Mediterranean as well.  The word "Taboulli" is Arabic for "little spicy."  The spice to which the name refers is mostly due to the herbs and lemon juice found in the dish.  In the Levant, Tabouli is served on a lettuce leaf.  However, others eat it on pita, as a dip, or just plain.  Bulgar wheat, the primary ingredient of this dish, is made from wheat berries that are cooked, the bran removed, then dried and crushed.  The cooling nature of this salad made it a staple food in the Middle East and is not associated with any particular religious celebrations.  Tabouli is not to be confused with another popular dish called Couscous which is  made from moistened semolina wheat rolled in wheat flour.

Although the two are very similar, they stem from somewhat different areas.  Couscous is primarily eaten in the Maghreb region of Africa; this encompasses Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Mauritania.  It is especially strong among the Jewish population of this region.  Furthermore, Couscous is more often treated like a rice or pasta accompanying meat or stew. Taboulli is a stand alone dish to be enjoyed in its simple perfection.

Despite these differences, the bulgar for Tabouli and semolina for Couscous look very similar and are prepared identically.  Both grains absorb a lot of water relative to their size.  To prepare either grain, boil 1/5 c of water and add 1 c of the wheat.  Stir it a couple times to combine, then cover it and let it sit for about 20 min for the water to be absorbed into the wheat.  When it's done, fluff it up with a fork.  You may be surprised by the amount in the bowl after you fluff it.  

To make tabouli used the ingredients below.  I'm sorry I don't have any measurements, but I just didn't use any.  A lot of it is personal preference.  After you are done, you can enjoy this nice cool salad on a lettuce leaf just like the Levantines.  

Tabouli

Bulgar Wheat
Mint, chopped
Cilantro, chopped
Onion, chopped
Tomato,chopped
Lemon Juice
Salt and pepper