Glossary
Emptins – “a liquid leavening usually made at home from potatoes or hops and kept from one baking to the next” (Merriam-Webster) . . . possibly the first version of a salt rising bread starter
Indian meal (or meal) – the name the Colonial settlers gave to cornmeal
Knead – to work bread dough into a uniform mixture by pressing and folding the dough with your hands
Light dough – dough that has risen and doubled in size
Meal – see Indian meal
Middlings – poor or coarsely-ground flour
Pinch – equal to 1/8 teaspoon
Proofer – a warm, moist chamber where bread dough is placed for the purpose of encouraging the fermentation and rising of the dough
Railroad yeast – An early type of starter. There are different versions in different cookbooks; an early version from the late 1800s uses ginger. Several early 1900s cookbooks describe it as a mixture of cake yeast, potatoes, salt, sugar, and water that is allowed to set overnight or longer. Yet other recipes describe the source as coming from the brewing process.
Raisin’ or Risin’ or Rising – other names for a salt rising bread starter
Saleratus – a form of potassium or sodium bicarbonate, either manufactured or found naturally on the ground
Scald – to heat to a temperature just short of the boiling point
Warm place – an area or place for raising a starter, sponge or bread dough that is around 104 - 110°F (40-44°C)
Wild microbes – a mixture of wild yeasts, bacteria and other microscopic organisms naturally found in our environments. When introduced in flour/water mixtures at the right temperature, they reproduce and produce gas to raise the dough, as well as provide flavor profiles to the finished product.
The Three Stages of Salt Rising Bread
ONE
A Brief History of Salt Rising Bread . . . and why it matters
The continued interest in discovering our family histories – the people, their stories and the details of the lives they lived – is a powerful testament to the importance of tradition and memory. It grounds us and gives us connection. And one way we connect with our past is through food.
Until not so very long ago, salt rising bread was still being made in American kitchens by women who followed the recipes handed down to them by their mothers and grandmothers, one generation to the next. In many early pioneer homes, salt rising bread was the only bread baked. It was often an essential part of their everyday lives and wellbeing.
And then, for reasons having to do with societal change, a loss of family continuity and the special nature of the bread itself, the tradition of home-baked salt rising bread began to fade. However, through much of the 20th century, salt rising bread could be found in bakeries across the country. In California, for instance – far from Appalachia – the Van de Kamp’s bakery chain sold salt rising bread up and down the state until the mid-1970s. Today, Californians of a certain age still remember the salt rising bread from Van de Kamp’s and how good it tasted. How do we know? They’re some of Rising Creek Bakery’s best customers. They find our bakery online and tell us their stories. And not only Californians. Almost daily, we receive a phone call from someone in a faraway state asking if we really do make it . . . then asking, with a hopeful voice, “Does it have that salt rising smell?” These are people who remember eating salt rising bread many years before. They tell us how they’ve yearned to experience again that distinctive taste that carries them back through time, to memories of a cherished youth with extended family gathered around the kitchen table.
Van de Kamp’s Holland Dutch Bakery in Los Angeles, CA, was known for its salt rising bread.
For both of us, Susan and Jenny, baking is an integral part of who we are in relation to our lives and our families. In our separate paths to success with making salt rising bread, we each had great curiosity to understand more about it. Even though we had the best of teachers, there were things yet to be discovered. Where did it come from? Who first made it? Why did it sometimes work and other times not? What made its fermentation behave so unpredictably? We joined forces and began looking for answers. One mystery after the next presented itself to us until soon we had quite a list.
Our List of Mysteries
