of
fermentation, is something of which they have no conception, and thus
they will even regard this process of spoiling the paste by the acetous
fermentation, and then rectifying that acid by effervescence with an
alkali, as something positively meritorious. How else can they value and
relish bakers' loaves, such as some are, drugged with ammonia and other
disagreeable things, light indeed, so light that they seem to have
neither weight nor substance, but with no move sweetness or taste than
so much white cotton?

Some persons prepare bread for the oven by simply mixing it in the mass,
without kneading, pouring it into pans, and suffering it to rise there.
The air-cells in bread thus prepared are coarse and uneven; the bread is
as inferior in delicacy and nicety to that which is well kneaded as a
raw Irish servant to a perfectly educated and refined lady. The process
of kneading seems to impart an evenness to the minute air-cells, a
fineness of texture, and a tenderness and pliability to the whole
substance, that can be gained in no other way.

The divine principle of beauty has its reign over bread as well as over
all other things; it has its laws of aesthetics; and that bread which is
so prepared that it can be formed into separate and well-proportioned
loaves, each one carefully worked and moulded, will develop the most
beautiful results. After being moulded, the loaves should stand a little
while, just long enough to allow the fermentation going on in them to
expand each little air-cell to the point at which it stood before it was
worked down, and then they should be immediately put into the oven.

Many a good thing, however, is spoiled in the oven. We cannot but
regret, for the sake of bread, that our old steady brick ovens have been
almost universally superseded by those of ranges and cooking-stoves,
which are infinite in their caprices, and forbid all general rules. One
thing, however, may be borne in mind as a principle,--that the
excellence of bread in all its varieties, plain or sweetened, depends on
the perfection of its air-cells, whether produced by yeast, egg, or
effervescence, that one of the objects of baking is to fix these
air-cells, and that the quicker this can be done through the whole mass
the better will the result be. When cake or bread is made heavy by
baking too quickly, it is because the immediate formation of the top
crust hinders the exhaling of the moisture in the centre, and prevents
th