[Sca-cooks] Challah/braided bread
JIMCHEVAL at aol.com
JIMCHEVAL at aol.com
Mon Feb 25 07:39:08 PST 2013
I'm intrigued right off by the idea that Christians were already making
braided bread that early:
" In the 1400s in the Jews in southern Germany_1_
(aoldb://mail/write/template.htm#sdfootnote1sym) began adopting the braided bread the Christian
Germans were making for Sunday and using it as their special Sabbath bread.
This bread was called “berches” or “barches.”
According to written descriptions of these long braided loaves, they were
made with sourdough starter, white flour, no eggs (except as a wash on
top), very little shortening, and only a small amount of sugar. "
I'm guessing this was what the French call "pain benit"; that is, a
special bread made by a congregant to then be distributed during the service. In
France in later centuries this became like brioche, then brioche was simply
substituted. The above description is a credible idea of what it might
have been like before eggs and milk were later added.
I also find it curious that sourdough was being used in Germany, especially
for a fine bread. But then I don't know the German side of this period
very well.
Certainly an interesting paper. Thank you for posting the link.
Jim Chevallier
www.chezjim.com
Newly translated from Pierre Jean-Baptiste Le Grand d'Aussy:
Eggs, Cheese and Butter in Old Regime France
In a message dated 2/25/2013 7:16:11 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
galefridus at optimum.net writes:
here is the dropbox link to my wife's challah documentation.
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