people generally talk about food preservatives in a negative way. certainly, some of them are not great for you. but I want to take a moment to appreciate how wonderful food preservatives (and refrigeration and pasteurization and canning) are as well. it’s crazy how fast most normal food goes bad. like a loaf of real old fashioned bread will go stale after a day and then become moldy after a few more days. for almost all of human history, people just sort of lived with this, and if they wanted to make foods last they had to dry it out and/or drown it in salt or vinegar or alcohol. pickles and beef jerky are great, but it would suck if you had to eat them all the time.
This comment seems to imply Nisan missed something, but normal rye sourdough bread without any preservatives easily lasts (edit: should have said “can easily last under the right circumstances”) 7 days before going stale. Of course people can mean different things by “real old fashioned bread” but afaik sourdough bread was the standard method for most of human history.
Sourdough bread lasts 7 days without going stale?? Perhaps this depends on your climate. For me, plain sourdough is notably worse the next day and pretty crappy within 2-3. I assume people with no access to preservatives would have gotten used to this and would be more willing to eat food I consider bad tasting, but still.
Note, though, that this only applies to sourdough with just flour and water, no dough enrichment; breads with even small amounts of oil and sugar added stay soft much longer.
Maybe you’re right and it’s climate, perhaps I also meant something unusual with “stale” or it could also be a cultural difference between US and europe? I’m talking about bread like this (https://www.lazycatkitchen.com/sourdough-rye-bread-beginner-friendly/), stored in a bread box and perhaps wrapped in a cotton dish towel. Of course it does get a bit harder over time, but I can usually still eat it like completely normal bread even after 7 days. And note that I agree that pure wheat sourdough bread does get stale more quickly.
Sure, but “technological progress good” isn’t exactly an undersupplied viewpoint, is it? One counterpoint to food preservatives specifically is that the things that make food go bad are similar to what your body uses to digest food, so preserving food in this way can make it harder or harmful to digest. Other procedures like refrigeration and canning don’t have that particular problem.
This is what I tell people, you don’t get to have preservative less food of perfect preservation without it being economically feasible, you get to have stale food, tradeoffs to everything.
people generally talk about food preservatives in a negative way. certainly, some of them are not great for you. but I want to take a moment to appreciate how wonderful food preservatives (and refrigeration and pasteurization and canning) are as well. it’s crazy how fast most normal food goes bad. like a loaf of real old fashioned bread will go stale after a day and then become moldy after a few more days. for almost all of human history, people just sort of lived with this, and if they wanted to make foods last they had to dry it out and/or drown it in salt or vinegar or alcohol. pickles and beef jerky are great, but it would suck if you had to eat them all the time.
Huh, it takes a week for old-fashioned bread to go stale in my kitchen.
Check the ingredients for calcium propionate.
This comment seems to imply Nisan missed something, but normal rye sourdough bread without any preservatives easily lasts (edit: should have said “can easily last under the right circumstances”) 7 days before going stale. Of course people can mean different things by “real old fashioned bread” but afaik sourdough bread was the standard method for most of human history.
Sourdough bread lasts 7 days without going stale?? Perhaps this depends on your climate. For me, plain sourdough is notably worse the next day and pretty crappy within 2-3. I assume people with no access to preservatives would have gotten used to this and would be more willing to eat food I consider bad tasting, but still.
Note, though, that this only applies to sourdough with just flour and water, no dough enrichment; breads with even small amounts of oil and sugar added stay soft much longer.
Maybe you’re right and it’s climate, perhaps I also meant something unusual with “stale” or it could also be a cultural difference between US and europe? I’m talking about bread like this (https://www.lazycatkitchen.com/sourdough-rye-bread-beginner-friendly/), stored in a bread box and perhaps wrapped in a cotton dish towel. Of course it does get a bit harder over time, but I can usually still eat it like completely normal bread even after 7 days. And note that I agree that pure wheat sourdough bread does get stale more quickly.
Sure, but “technological progress good” isn’t exactly an undersupplied viewpoint, is it? One counterpoint to food preservatives specifically is that the things that make food go bad are similar to what your body uses to digest food, so preserving food in this way can make it harder or harmful to digest. Other procedures like refrigeration and canning don’t have that particular problem.
I mean I think so; I have never in my life heard anyone say good things about preservatives in food until now.
Ok, but non-normal-old-fashioned bread tastes bad and has boring texture, unlike nice crusty normal old-fashioned bread.
This is what I tell people, you don’t get to have preservative less food of perfect preservation without it being economically feasible, you get to have stale food, tradeoffs to everything.