BREAD 183 



characteristic flavours of bread as a battle of flavours dis- 

 tinguishing that from a battle of germs in fermentation. 



The baker seeks to set up an alcoholic fermentation, but the 

 lactic ferment lives on the same sort of food ; and though under 

 ordinary conditions of baking the alcoholic fermentation has 

 the better chance of thriving, lactic fermentation is almost 

 invariably present to some extent. There may be also a 

 fermentation whereby the alcohol produced in a healthy fer- 

 mentation may be converted into acetic acid. Other ferments 

 may be present, and if the baker allows, through miscalculations 

 as to the necessary times and temperatures or through other 

 errors, the proper and pleasant effects of alcoholic fermentation 

 to be overcome unduly by the other fermentations present, his 

 bread suffers, and he gets either a tasteless, or a sour, or evil- 

 smelling bread according to the magnitude of his error. Flours 

 from some wheats yield bread which is tasteless, even though 

 the bakehouse treatment given them be correct. Such lack of 

 flavour is usually correlated with a low natural moisture — in 

 other words, such wheats are usually grown in a dry, hot 

 climate ; and though it is true that wheats subjected to great 

 heat where the summer rainfall is high or substantial, such as 

 those grown in Hungary and Manitoba, possess a very pleasant 

 flavour, there are exceptions to the rule as to lack of flavour, 

 and one is inclined to look behind the climatic influence for 

 the cause of the characteristic. As a help to healthy fermenta- 

 tion, bakers use to some extract " malt extract." The proportion 

 used is so small that the direct effect on flavour must be nil ; yet 

 the actual effect is in some cases substantial. An infinitesimal 

 proportion of diastase has a potent effect on flavour, and I 

 suggest, but do not as yet assert, that the natural flavour of 

 wheaten flour depends to a large extent on its diastatic 

 capacity. If sugar be added to the dough the effect on flavour 

 is practically nil. 



Closely associated with flavour in bread is its physical 

 behaviour in the mouth. If it there becomes doughy, its true 

 flavour is obscured ; and that is one reason why, if the true 

 flavour of the bread is to be ascertained, it should be eaten 

 one day old, and not soon after it comes out of the oven. 



This by an easy transition brings forward one point as to 

 digestibility. Saliva does important work, partly mechanical 

 and partly chemical, in the digestion of food. If bread forms 



