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☠️ Poison Pantry 1905

Unfermented Bread

An ounce of hydrochloric acid into the dough water, for readers who find yeast unwholesome.

From
Consolidated Library of Modern Cooking and Household Recipes
Published
1905
Also printed in
1 other book
Yikes Scale
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Exactly as printed, 1905

Fermented bread is sometimes considered unwholesome. Those who are of this opinion may make their bread as follows: Mix 1 ounce of bicarbonate of soda with 8 pounds of flour. Stir 1 ounce of hydrochloric acid with 4 pints of warm water. Stir the liquor into the flour briskly, and with a wooden spoon, till the ingredients are thoroughly blended; divide the dough into loaves, and bake these immediately in a brisk oven. It will need to bake as long as bread usually does.

Consolidated Library of Modern Cooking and Household Recipes, 1905. Public domain; transcription unaltered.

So what happens if I make it?

The chemistry is real: acid and soda cancel to leave salt and carbon dioxide, and the carbon dioxide raises the loaf. Done exactly right, you eat bread and salt.

The margin is the problem. No concentration is given for the acid, so you cannot balance the equation, and hydrochloric acid on a modern shelf is masonry-grade muriatic carrying iron and arsenic.

Notes from the 21st century

  • Yeast was genuinely distrusted. Fermentation was poorly understood and widely suspected of producing something unwholesome. The recipe is an answer to a real anxiety.
  • Four books in our set print a version. Cassell's, the Consolidated Library and two others. It was a recognised method, not one crank's idea.
  • Baking powder solved this properly. It is the same reaction with food-grade acid salts, measured and stable. It is why this recipe vanished.

Also in this book

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