The Politics of Bread

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“We are made up of a lot of different nationalities mainly brought from the lower classes, and in almost every decent-sized village in our country there is a baker from Hungary or Poland or France who can and does still make his round odorous healthful loaves… And in spite of this… we continue everywhere to buy the monstrosities that lie, all slices and tasteless, on the bread-counters of the nation.” –M.F.K. Fischer, How to Cook a Wolf

Fisher first published this observation in 1942, but in a land built on immigrants and displaced peoples, I think this still must ring true. Only now we have very few neighborhood bakeries, but many grocery stores, convenience stores and corner stores that all carry sad squishy sliced loaves, and “specialty” grocery stores like Whole Foods that target an upper middle-class audience and carry “Artisan” loaves, which you can purchase unsliced, or sliced.

The act of calling a simple thing, such as a loaf of bread, a word like “artisan” just to cater to an economic class intrigues me. Look up “artisan bread” on any established internet search engine and one if bound to encounter Challah, French Bread, Italian Bread, Focaccia; Sourdough. You’ll encounter books aplenty insisting it is indeed possible to bake such creations in your very own kitchen. And you may sit, astounded in your chair, as I am doing, that we even need to be told it is actually feasible for us to cook breads in our own homes whose recipes made their way across sea and land into America in the minds of immigrants and have survived by being passed down through generations.

Our collective memories are packaged in cute brown bags with quaint bakery names imprinted on the side and sold back to us as a people because we have forgotten our histories. America, a land built on Manifest Destiny, built on the dreams of “a better tomorrow,” built on heavily lower class immigrant populations, enslaved populations, and displaced peoples. In a land of people looking to forget their history in hopes of assimilation and attaining a slice of the American dream, it is no wonder that the promises of gentrification and convenience in soft white tasteless slices offered in white plastic bags with circles of primary colors, securely fastened with a twist-tie caught our eye. It is no wonder, in an attempt to assimilate, in an attempt to reject our histories and differences, we have, for the most part, forgotten how to make our own bread.

Now I see these loaves of history, once baked by artisan bakers, farmers wives, hired cooks and tenement mothers, being sold in specialty grocery stores and accessible to those privileged enough to be able to purchase that sliver of their identity in a store. What was once undesirable has become fashionable at an obscene price, and those soft white slices housewives once dreamed of are left for those who can not afford the loaves their ancestors once baked.

Perhaps it is a lot to ask. A bit of ground wheat, some yeast for rising, some water to bind, and some salt to season. Hands to knead the ingredients into a soft elastic dough, rhythm beneath fingertips and the heel of one’s palm. A warm oven to bake a loaf. But I don’t think it’s much to ask, and I’m sure it is possible for us to make our own bread again.