These tips come straight from the baker’s mouth. And no one knows bread like Mike, who gets up each morning long before sunrise to bake what’s got to be the world’s most mouth-watering foccaccio!
To keep bread fresh, Mike says, don’t keep it in the refrigerator. That will make a loaf go stale before its time.
The best container for fresh bread is a cloth bag, believe it or not. Second-best storage choice is an old-fashioned wooden bread box. Both will allow baked goods to breathe, rather than trapping air and moisture like a plastic bag does, yet still retain enough moisture to keep the bread soft and tasty.
You can and should put bread in a plastic bag if you’re going to freeze it, however. Choose a heavy-duty plastic freezer bag, use a drinking straw to suck out the extra air and create a vaccuum, then seal the bag up tight.
Plan ahead to pull the bread out of the freezer in the morning if you want it for suppertime, and let it thaw completely before you open the bag. Then transfer the loaf to the cloth bread bag and keep it at room temperature, just as if it had just come fresh from the oven.
So, bread crusts help fight cancer, you say, Rob? Excellent news — I’ve always loved the crusty bits best. Just as well, too. My mother would’ve “tanned my hide” if she caught me cutting off the crusts…
Great advice! If you must keep the bread in its original plastic bag, you can sprinkle some grains of rice into the bag to help absorb excess moisture.
And for heaven’s sake, don’t cut the crusts off of your kid’s bread – the crust of the bread is the healthiest part!
Yeah, I’ve always kept bread in plastic in the fridge, when the weather is warm. It delays it going all green and fuzzy, but I think Mike’s right about the fridge making the bread go stale faster.
hm, a cloth bag? I usually keep it in the fridge for fear it will go bad before we can eat it all….
maybe I’ll give this one a try….
hm…