Cotton bread
by hexacoto
Instead of the one-dollar cheapo sliced bread I usually get from ShopRite, for some reason I decided to buy this loaf labelled “Italian Bread” that cost 50 cents more, and it looks pretty good. It was sliced, had sesame seeds studded all over it, and had a good heft to it.
When I prised a slice loose from the loaf, it was the softest, fluffiest bread I’ve ever felt. It couldn’t be real: its white porous body yielded to my gentlest touch, I could roll it up and it would stay unbroken.
I hated it.
Seriously, why are sliced bread in America so soft? They flop around like limp, floppy fish and are useless against hardy condiments such as crunchy peanut butter. Have you tried applying chunky peanut butter against soft bread before? The moment a knife with a load of crunchy peanut butter meets soft bread, there is no way it can be spread because any attempt to do so results in a messy mutilation of the bread, where it ends up dented, misshapen or torn.
Are these bread made from cotton plants? Most bread I’ve had in Europe are much sturdier, as far as I could recall, so much so that stale bread become acceptable substitutes for frisbee throwing. Or for making knedliky’s (bread dumplings).
The Hexacoto 
That’s because most of our bread isn’t quite “real” bread… if it’s got more than 5 ingredients, and you don’t recognize most of them (water, various types of flour, leaven (or yeast), etc.), it’s not real bread. Most of Europe values food a bit more than we do here in good ol’ ‘mericuh, therefore they use better, fresher ingredients and get bread from a real baker, not a factory.
see: http://michaelpollan.com/books/in-defense-of-food/
I see this seems to be a new blog for you, very quirky and interesting, hope it goes well for you, good luck!
Thanks for reading! Yea, bread certainly has taken an interesting direction in this country. Though I wonder why is there an obsession to make bread as soft as mush, of all things? Choking hazard?
Thanks for your well wishes!
Your illustrations never fail to amuse me.