Thursday, October 17, 2013

Bread Baking and Salt

I have been baking bread for years now, at least several loaves every other weekend. I’m to the point I don’t look at a recipe anymore it’s simply memorized.

Last week I baked two loaves and as always have to try a piece of warm from the oven bread! Something wasn’t right about the taste, it kind of tasted like it was just flour and water baked. A very flat taste.

Hmmm what went wrong???
I do stage all the ingredients on the kitchen counter-top first, then measure and add to the mix. Then I remembered,,,, I forgot the salt! The recipe calls for one teaspoon of salt per loaf and this little bit of salt makes an unbelievable difference in the taste of bread.

I baked two more loaves yesterday making sure I had the salt added and sure enough the taste was back to normal!

Moral of the story:
Always have the recipe in front of you as this could have been disastrous if I were canning 70 quarts of meat and left an ingredient out that was key to flavor.


10 comments:

  1. I've had Paul comment on a bread (or two) before and they were the ones that I forgot to add the salt to. Amazing how that "little" bit of salt makes such a difference in taste.

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  2. Mike,

    I find it's easy to get distracted when baking from memory. I'll start to measure something out like flour and my son or husband will ask me a question. I usually will forget how many cups I've measured and have to start again.
    It's hard to fix a measurement or lack there of if you've already baked or processed the food.

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  3. Sounds to me, your bread wasn't its usual salt of the earth that day. ;-)

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  4. Carolyn,
    Thanks for the confirmation on the taste difference that no salt makes. I was wondering if maybe I was over reacting.

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  5. Sandy,
    I know what you mean! To help avoid skipping ingredients I’m almost finished putting together a clip board that holds just my common recipes. I keep this close by and now it will be very convenient so I will use it where as before I had to go to my computer room and get the recipes. It’s not that the computer room is that far away but I’m assembling a new booklet of basic recipes that are made from long term stored food (disaster cooking) and I hate to pull a recipe out because it tends not to get back.

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  6. No matter how many years I've made something in particular I've always had to have my recipes on hand. I guess I'm too easily distracted. :)

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  7. Gammy,
    I have to agree with you, I will have the recipe in front of me from now on.

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  8. Don't forget that salt will last forever if you keep it dry. $10 can buy you a lifetime supply and it's amazing something so inexpensive can make all the difference in the world!

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  9. What If,
    Thanks for visiting. Yes you are correct, simple things like salt are cheap but also so very necessary for survival, from making food taste better to preserving it.

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