Wherever you may go in the world—whatever the local customs, language, dress, or taste in food—you will find some form of bread! Of course, there are almost as many varieties of bread as there are nations.

In China, bread is made from rice flour. In India, they use millet. In Germany and in the Scandinavian countries, bread is made from rye and barley. There are countries that use beans, potatoes, and even acorns in the making of bread!

But bread as we usually think of it is made from cereal grains of various types. It is the most important single food to the largest number of people. The reason is simply that bread contains the largest share of the food substances we need for health for the least amount of money. Without bread, it would be necessary for people to eat larger quantities of more expensive foods such as eggs, milk, and fruits to maintain their health. With bread, even the poorest peoples are able to sustain life. That’s why bread is called “the staff of life.”

In earliest times, man used to chew grain seeds to obtain the energy he knew they provided. More than 3,000 years before Christ, the Egyptians learned to crush the grain to a flour between stones. They added water to form a dough, shaped it into flat cakes, and baked it.

There are two kinds of bread, leavened and unleavened. Leavened bread contains some substance which makes bubbles of carbon dioxide gas and makes the loaf rise. Unleavened bread is always dry and hard. Most ordinary bread is leavened with yeast. But biscuits, muffins, cakes, and pastries are leavened with baking powder or sour milk and soda.

Though bread can be made from many plants, the best and finest bread is made from wheat. This is because wheat contains a substance called gluten, which holds the gas bubbles better, and this produces a lighter loaf of bread.

By the way, the expression “to break bread” dates back to the ancient Hebrews. They used to bake their bread in thin sheets which they broke instead of cutting.