THE GREATEST THING SINCE...

I can't make a rye as good as this

There are many things touted as “The greatest thing since sliced bread”, but to me, the greatest thing probably is sliced bread.  The first loaf of machine-sliced bread was sold on July 7, 1928. Otto Rohwedder and worked on and perfected a bread slicing machine. He called it, eponymously, the Rohwedder Bread Slicer. He had a hard time selling it to bakers – little did they know – but finally found one to give it a try. The rest is basically history, enhanced by a new entry into the book of household phrases. 

I absolutely love bread. I devote ample room to bread in my freezer where it keeps best. At any one time in my kitchen, you should be able to find loaves of my own homemade white or wheat, perhaps a store-bought loaf of seeded rye and English muffins, some drop biscuits, sweet or savory, and perhaps my banana bread or raisin bread. I know I’ve said that it is maintained that you could live on a diet of orange juice, milk, and chocolate. Oh yes, I could, but I’d have to add bread to the diet.

Sometimes I wish I had a bread slicing machine of my own, but they take up too much space I need for other things - like bread making. I've tried those bread slicing guides and they are a pain in the you-know-where. So we get a wonky slice every once in a while - that's o.k., it won't be around for long.

I’ve devoted a blog or three to bread, the homemade, slice-it-yourself kind.  You can read the entries here, here, and here.  Any way you slice it, and even if you don’t, bread really is the staff of life.

My own raisin bread, minus a few slices