Good Bread Is Back: A Contemporary History of French Bread, the Way It Is Made, and the People Who Make It

Steven Laurence Kaplan

ISBN 10: 0822338335 / ISBN 13: 9780822338338

Editore: Duke University Press, 2006

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Like its subject matter, this book is a delicious and irresistible labor of love. Steven Laurence Kaplan has distilled his vast knowledge of France and French bread into a delightfully readable story that is also a brilliant, illuminating model of how to write contemporary social history.--David A. Bell, Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities, Johns Hopkins University.

Codice articolo CIN0822338335A

Dati bibliografici

• Titolo: Good Bread Is Back: A Contemporary History of French Bread, the Way It Is Made, and the People Who Make It
• Editore: Duke University Press
• Data di pubblicazione: 2006
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 0822338335
• ISBN 13: 9780822338338
• Rilegatura: Hardback
• Condizione: Fair

Descrizione articolo

Riassunto

In Good Bread Is Back, historian and leading French bread expert Steven Laurence Kaplan takes readers into aromatic Parisian bakeries as he explains how good bread began to reappear in France in the 1990s, following almost a century of decline in quality. Kaplan describes how, while bread comprised the bulk of the French diet during the eighteenth century, by the twentieth, per capita consumption had dropped off precipitously. This was largely due to social and economic modernization and the availability of a wider choice of foods. But part of the problem was that the bread did not taste good. In a culture in which bread is sacrosanct, bad bread was more than a gastronomical disappointment; it was a threat to France's sense of itself. By the mid-1990s bakers rallied, and bread officially designated as "bread of the French tradition" was in demand throughout Paris. Kaplan meticulously describes good bread's ideal crust and crumb (interior), mouth feel, aroma, and taste. He discusses the breadmaking process in extraordinary detail, from the ingredients to the kneading, shaping, and baking, and even the sound bread should make when it comes out of the oven. Kaplan does more than tell the story of the revival of good bread in France. He makes the reader see, smell, taste, feel, and even hear why it is so very wonderful that good bread is back.

Informazioni sugli autori

Steven Laurence Kaplan is the Goldwin Smith Professor of European History at Cornell University and Visiting Professor of Modern History at the University of Versailles, Saint-Quentin. His many books include a guide to the best bread in Paris, Cherchez le pain: Guide des meilleures boulangeries de Paris, and The Bakers of Paris and the Bread Question, 1770–1775, also published by Duke University Press. The French government has twice knighted Kaplan for his contributions to the “sustenance and nourishment” of French culture.

Steven Laurence Kaplan is the Goldwin Smith Professor of European History at Cornell University and Visiting Professor of Modern History at the University of Versailles, Saint-Quentin. His many books include a guide to the best bread in Paris, Cherchez le pain: Guide des meilleures boulangeries de Paris, and The Bakers of Paris and the Bread Question, 1770–1775, also published by Duke University Press. The French government has twice knighted Kaplan for his contributions to the “sustenance and nourishment” of French culture.