Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1882-08-03
Bread Baking in London.

A London bakehouse is almost iavari.
aoly situated in a cellar. Generally it is
cellar that might do well enough for
tne reception of lumber, but is utterly
unnC for any other purpose, and, of all
purposes to which it might possibly be
put, TOT the manufacture of bread. The
writer spent night in such a place a
snort time ago. The walls were bullying,
coowebby and old; the ovens were un-
oer the pavement of the street; the
refuse OF the bakehouse was deposited
near the ovens; the four or five COM
Partments into which the cellar was
DIVIDED were small and close, aud when
tne gas was lighted at midnight cock
roacnes were swarming over walls and
celilngs, chasing each other about the
sacks of flour, and holding assemblies in
the oins. This, however, was rather
superior bakehouse. The dirty and
olsmal caverns in which most of our
oread is made are inaccessible. If the
Daker does not regard cleanliness as
moral obligation, he is, at any rate,
iully aware that the cellars in which he
Practlces his mystery are not quite such
snow places as they ought to be. The
circumstance that they are underground,
ana that the ovens are so placed as to
draw the air which feeds them-often
from the close proximity of the drains
over the troughs in which the dough is
kneaded, is in itself sufficiently appall-
ing. Bread readily absorbs the air that
surrounds it, and ought never to be
made or to be kept in confined places.
In London, however, it is habitually
made in dens so confined and nauseous
that the bakers trade is one of the most
unhealthy in existence.
The condition of the bakehouses is
one of the least evils connected with
the existing system of bread-making.
Bread Is made now after much the same
fashion as was in vogue, probably, in
the Cities of the Plain. The baker still
uses his naked arms in the process of
kneading. The "sponge" is laid in long
wooden troughs. Over these the Jour
neyman baker, often working in tenn
perature of ninety degrees, bends for
half an hour or so while he kneads the
dough. Of course he perspires. His
occupation is as laborlous almost as that
of the blacksmith, and produces similar
outward effects. However much he may
be disposed to cleanliness, he can not
pursue his occupation except under
conditions that to any one not accus-
toned to the process are sickening to
behold. After belaboring the dough
much as a housewife belabors feather
bed, he "rubs his arms out''-that is,
he clears them of the paste with which
they are encrusted by dipping his hands
in drv flour and rubbing them down his
arms. The dough comes off in little
rolls, which are returned to the trough
ane kneaded in with the bread. This il
not the case only in bakehouses which
are doing a 'scutting'' business. 1t il
the process common in all bakehouses.
The dough which adheres to the arms,
saturated as it must be with impurity,
would otherwise be so much waste, and
in a bakehouse nothing is wasted.
Such things are not pleasant to dwell
up IN; but bread is the chief food of the
people, and it is as we'll that we should
know how it is manufactured. Before
being made up into loaves and put in
the oven it goes through tiresome
amount of handling. After being
kneaded in the troughs it is pulled out
in pieces and rolled vigorously on
bench. Now and then a knife is taken
up and the bench is scraped, and the
scrapingS are returned to the trough.
The old proverb about eating peck of
dirt has more literal application than
is generally supposed. We take great
deal of our allowance in our bread. 1t
is a remarkable fact that there is more
popular ignorance on the subject OF food
than Oh anything else which is necessa.
ry to our daily life. In nothing, more
over, do we take so much on trust as in
the article of bread. If, by some acct |
dent, the public could watch our bakers |
at work for few hours there would be |
a general and immediate resort to home
made Fbread.-PaU Mall Gazette.