WI LLIAM
THOMPSON
SEDGWICK
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology
UCSB LIBRARY
X-
ON THE
HEALTHY MANUFACTURE
OF BREAD.
ir on tfje Astern of 3Dc. HDaug;li0f),
BY
BENJAMIN WARD RICHARDSON, M.D., F.R.S.
ILonBon :
BAILLIERE, TINDALL, & COX,
KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND.
1884.
[A II rights reset ved. ]
Printed by Hazetl, Watson, and I'iney, Limited, London and Aylcslmry
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PREFATORY .
CHAPTER II.
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION OF THE RADICAL CHANGE
IN THE MANUFACTURE OF BREAD BY HIS
METHOD ........ 6
CHAPTER III.
MANUFACTURE OF BREAD BY FERMENTATION. . I"]
CHAPTER IV.
THE COURSE OF DISCOVERY TOWARDS THE MANU-
FACTURE OF AERATED BREAD . 25
CHAPTER V.
THE ORIGINAL DAUGLISH PROCESS .
CHAPTER VI.
THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS
3 2
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER VII.
WHEAT BREAD AND FLOURS . . 49
CHAPTER VIII.
FERMENTATION AND AERATION A CONTRAST. . 58-
CHAPTER IX.
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY ADVANTAGES TO THE
WORKMEN BY THE AERATED SYSTEM OF BREAD
MANUFACTURE 68
CHAPTER X.
PUBLIC ADVANTAGES OF AERATED BREAD, IN
RELATION TO HEALTH 8 1
APPENDIX.
A BRIEF PERSONAL OUTLINE OF THE LIFE OF
DR. DAUGLISH . . . . . -97
CHAPTER I.
PREFATORY.
a time when the public mind
has become most attentive to all
subjects having reference to do-
mestic sanitation, I have thought
it would be opportune to publish a short
work on the labours of the late Dr. Daug-
lish, and on his system of bread manufacture.
What claim I have to speak upon this
subject rests on the following facts :
In 1862, while conducting The Social
Science Review, I wrote an article in that
paper on modern bread making. Dauglish,
as ingenious and earnest a sanitarian, as well
as social reformer, I ever remember to have
met, called upon me thereupon to explain his
method of bread making, then in its first
PREFATORY.
days. He entirely gained my attention to
it, and awakened an interest which has never
abated. Actuated by what he told me, I was
tempted to institute inquiries on a subject of
which I previously knew very little, and was
led to contribute further articles on bread
manufacture, and on the grievances to which
the bakers of the metropolis were subjected.
A lecture in the old Hanover Square
Rooms, on March lyth, 1864, over which
lecture Lord Ebury presided, drew my mind
still closer to the study of bread manufacture.
The lecturer was a master baker, and with
excellent skill, backed by practical knowledge
of many years' acquirement, he placed before
us, in terms not easily to be forgotten, the fact
that in London at that time twelve thousand
men were compelled to labour night and day,
apparently for no other reason than the
precedent of an unnatural and absurd custom.
He showed that with their families these
men formed a community in London of over
twenty-five thousand people, and he described
the work and the mode of work in a manner
which startled many of us by its revelations
of bad sanitation, bad alike for workers and
consumers.
PREFATORY.
Later on, when I had examined for myself,
and had come to know a considerable num-
ber of facts relating to the condition of the
workers in the baking trade, I began to study
the processes of manufacture simply as such,
and so reverted to the system Dr. Dauglish
had explained to me, comparing and contrast-
ing it with the other methods in common use.
By degrees I was led to a still closer
connection with and study of the Dauglish
method, and since the lamented death of the
inventor I have for several years taken* a
special part in it as a director and scientific
adviser of the company which he founded.
If only out of respect to the memory of
Dr. Dauglish, and to place his, as yet, little
appreciated work again before the world, I
should be content to write this brief memoir.
But there are other reasons which add to the
desire. I am convinced, from careful and
prolonged observation, that the Dauglish
method of bread manufacture is on the whole
the best that has been discovered. Accord-
ing to my appreciation of it, it is the cleanliest
of all the processes known and followed ; it calls
for less drudgery, and, it is not unjust to say,
less objectionable labour, from the employed
PREFATORY.
in bread manufacture ; it inflicts less arduous
toil, and so lessens the rapid wearing out of
the body, which is an unfortunate fate of
many of those who are engaged in the manu-
facture of the staff of life ; it supplies a purer
article to those who depend, largely, upon
the staff of life for their daily aliment. Lastly,
it supplies, I think, a better article, one which
gives to the public the fullest food value that
can be got out of the corn from which the
food is made, and which enables the manu-
facture of all kinds of flour or meal, white
meal, mixed meal, whole meal, to be most
completely and most easily produced.
For these reasons, apart from any in which
mere kindly sentiment for the inventor is
concerned, it occurs to me that the task of
writing the coming pages is well deserving
the labour that may be bestowed upon it.
The Dauglish system, as it stands at the
present moment, may be considered as prac-
tically perfected. The inventor left a few
details, which, though important, did not
affect the general principle he had in view,
and which he brought into practice. Those
details have been one by one introduced, and
the whole system has been brought to such
PREFATORY.
excellent working that any demand for bread
made by it can be met. How far an
extremely large demand has been met, how
steadily, and how increasingly, is open now
to the public observation in London every
day.
The practical working and completion of
the Dauglish method is another and final
reason for the present exposition of it as a
part of the social history of this great city at
the present period of its development.
In carrying out the duty conveyed by the
nature of the task I shall, as far as possible,
in referring to the process which Dauglish
introduced, and to the difficulties in the
manufacture of bread which he endeavoured
to rectify, allow him, through what he has
left behind him, to speak for his invention in
his own words and mode of expression. These
were always clear, concise, and sufficient.
CHAPTER II.
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION OF THE RADICAL
CHANGE IN THE MANUFACTURE OF BREAD
BY HIS METHOD.
JR. DAUGLISH, in one of his
earliest attempts to make his pro-
cess known, explained that a lecture
delivered by Professor Odling be-
fore the Society of Arts and Manufactures
conveyed to him unmistakably that nearly, if
not quite, all the evils complained of in the old
system of bread manufacture viz., the spoil-
ing of the flour, the necessity for using alum,
the long hours of labour, and the consequent
unhealthiness of the trade of the baker arise
out of the employment of fermentation for
the raising of bread.
He next, in explanation of his design,
DAUGLISITS EXPOSITION.
described that bread-making essentially con-
sists in completely incorporating flour, water,
salt, and carbonic acid with each other in
such a manner as that they shall form a
tenacious, elastic, and bulky mass, in which
the aeriform constituent bears to the solid a
proportion of about three or four to one, and
which on being placed in the oven and
thoroughly baked shall swell to about double
this proportion.
After setting forth these simple proposi-
tions, Dauglish proceeded to show that while
the mechanical difficulties that lie in the way
of improvement in manufacture are overcome
with moderate facility, there was up to his
time another series of difficulties which were
not so easily managed. These he called the
chemical difficulties, and he explained them
briefly in such terms as follow :
" The mechanical part of bread-making is
very easy of accomplishment, and its results,
like all other mechanical processes, can always
be relied on with certainty. It is the chemi-
cal part out of which all the difficulties and
uncertainties arise, and which has presented
the only obstacle in the way of bread
manufacture participating in that marvellous
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION.
progress of the industrial arts which is the
most distinguishing feature of the present
age."
What the nature of the chemical difficulties
is he defines in a further exposition.
"The chemical changes within the sub-
stance of the dough, which it is the object
of the baker to effect, are those which shall
result in the alcoholic fermentation' of trans-
formed starch or glucose, whereby these
bodies are broken up into alcohol and car-
bonic acid, which latter the carbonic acid-
is the only product desired, but which cannot
be obtained without the previous transforma-
tion or degradation, more or less, of the
constituents of the flour.
In the first operation of bread making
the preparation of the sponge the baker
mixes up together into a soup-like paste
flour, warm water, and yeast or leaven ; this
he allows to stand for some hours, during
which active fermentation is set up, and
bubbles of carbonic acid are rapidly formed
and rise to the surface. The prolonged action,
of warmth and moisture, combined with that
of the yeast or leaven, change the whole
body of paste into a ferment sufficient to
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION.
affect a large quantity of flour when incorpo-
rated with it. In forming a sponge the
necessity of using a large quantity of yeast
is avoided on the one hand, while the length
of time that would otherwise be required for
putting the whole of the flour into a state of
active fermentation is considerably shortened,
and the deterioration of the flour, which is
caused by the prolonged action of warmth
and moisture, is proportionately lessened."
Dr. Dauglish observed, in relation to the
above account of the common process all but
exclusively in use in his day, that when sound
flour is employed the true alcoholic fermenta-
tion is only the later stage of what is termed
the panary fermentation. It is in that stage
that the yeast acts upon the glucose or grape
sugar so as to break it up into alcohol and
carbonic acid. But as in sound flour there is
very little, not more than a trace of, sugar,
and as in it the gluten is wholly or almost
wholly unaltered, certain portions of the
starch of the flour and of the gluten must
have passed through the necessary changes
for the alcoholic fermentation to act. This
is done in the sponge, when the gluten, by its
own spontaneous tendency to change under
io DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION.
these conditions, assisted by the yeast, be-
comes metamorphic, and immediately acts
upon the starch, changing the starch into
dextrine and grape sugar, with propagation
of the yeast plant at .the expense of a small
portion of the gluten. The sponge, there-
fore, yields, when the flour is sound, all the
materials, the dextrine and glucose, the
diastase and the yeast, in a state ready to
pass into active alcoholic fermentation, and
to give up the necessary bubbles of carbonic
acid immediately their complete incorporation
with the flour is secured.
If all flour that is employed for the manu-
facture of bread were sound, the rule of
decomposition defined above would be very
definite. But when the flour is unsound a
very different state of things is presented.
Unsound flour, Dr. Dauglish pointed out,
is flour in which some of the changes on
which panary fermentation depends have
taken place to a greater or smaller extent,
and which are somewhat analogous to malt-
ing. " The gluten has already become
metamorphic, and the starch partly or wholly
changed into dextrine or glucose. The
gluten has lost more or less of its elasticity,
DAUGLISITS EXPOSITION.
and is ready, immediately on the application
of warmth and moisture, not only to pass
rapidly into a state of solution, but to act
with the greatest energy on the partially
changed starch, completing its alteration into
glucose, so that a running sticky mass results
from the attempt at fermentation.
It is seen from these facts that when the
ordinary method of fermentation, by means
of yeast, is carried out with an inferior class
of flour, the results of the fermentation are
most uncertain, and may be most objection-
able in so far as the quality of the product,
the bread, is concerned. Nor does such a
statement of fact include all that has to be
told, for Dauglish detected that the same
state of things may be, and indeed often is,
brought about when even sound flour has
been used either by inexperienced persons,
who do not understand the management of
fermentation, and the' length of time or
temperature necessary, or by peculiar states
of and changes in the atmosphere, by which
the fermentative operations are so rapidly
hastened in the earlier stages as to become
almost or quite unmanageable.
Between perfectly sound flour and that
12 DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION.
which runs, in the manner described, on the
application of a ferment, Dauglish showed
that there are indefinite shades of varieties.
In these varieties of change he traced out
the derangements and irregularities which
are met with in establishments where attempts
are made to produce bread on a large scale
by division of labour, and to turn it out ready
for use at regular times; and when he had
fully exhibited all the drawbacks connected
with the then existing systems he proceeded
to explain the new system which he had
invented, and which was founded on the
radical improvement of doing away with the
process of fermentation altogether in the
manufacture of bread.
In introducing this radical modification he
did, in fact, more than he seems to have been
fully aware of at the time. It turned out
afterwards that in the manufacture of whole
meal bread, and of the'bread commonly known
as brown bread, the old or fermentation
method was not directly applicable ; that the
flour out of which such bread had to be made
must be added to other and finer flour in a
state of fermentation before a loaf could be
produced ; and that in consequence two
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION. 13
distinct processes had to be carried out in
order to produce one result. It turned out
also that, by the new process, one action
alone was called for, and that through every
step of manufacture of the whole meal, or
brown, or coarse bread, the result was as
successful as if fine or white flour had
been manipulated. Why this should be so
will be shown further on, but it deserves to
be mentioned thus early in order to indicate
how excellent the new process was, and how
good it was from the moment of its inception.
It has been brought forward as an advan-
tage of the Dauglish process that it would
enable' manufacturers, if it were generally
adopted, to bring into daily consumption
more nutritious kinds of flour in place of the
expensive fine wheaten flour which is still
in common use. It was the inventor's pure
and simple-minded pride that he had dis-
covered a means by which this desirable end,
tending towards national thrift and economy,
could be realized. For although, as he stated,
it is quite true that some of the coarser flours,
owing to the existence in them of unstable
albuminoid compounds, have often commenced
to undergo a process of panary fermentation
i 4 DAUGLISITS EXPOSITION.
which renders the after or baker's process un-
certain, it is not to be understood that such
flours are therefore valueless, and to be cast
aside as food that cannot be applied for the
wants of the people. On the contrary, such
flours can be so utilized by the new process
as to be transformed into bread as light and
edible as any other, and to many persons
preferable to all other. I for one prefer a
bread which is not made of the whitest
wheaten flour, in which the starchy material
and the gluten form the only constituent
parts of much nutrient value, and I agree
in this particular with many more.
We have, indeed, in these last few years,
largely owing to the indefatigable exertions
of Miss Yates, become very familiar with
what is.now known as "whole meal bread."
The fact that such bread contains all the
essential food elements supplied by the grain
of wheat is now well recognized, and under
the improvements which have been intro-
duced for decortication of the grain, so as
to retain the useful and remove the hurtful
parts, we have obtained on a large scale a
whole-meal flour which is fast coming into
general use. The greatest obstacle to the
DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION. 15
general use of whole-meal flour has arisen
from the difficulty of converting it by the
fermentation process, and by one single and
continuous act, into bread. This difficulty
and the reason for it will be explained more
fully in a future page, as dependent on the
interference of a fermenting substance in the
outer coating of the wheat grain, called
cerealine. It is sufficient for me to say, in
this place, that when instead of the slow and
indirect process of fermentation for the pro-
duction of whole-meal bread, the aerated
method is adopted, all the difficulties dis-
appear, and the loaf from whole-meal is
as easily and quickly manufactured as that
from any other flour, including the so-called
finest kind of wheaten flour. Hence, for the
manufacture of whole-meal bread for public
institutions the system has been employed
on the largest scale and with the most
complete success, while since the whole-
meal has become popular in the community
generally the same plan has been continued
with an equal advantage and readiness, no
modification of machinery or procedure being
demanded or introduced.
In summary, the Dauglish process answers
1 6 DAUGLISH'S EXPOSITION.
as well for the finest wheat flour as for the
coarser kinds, while it gives to the coarser
kinds advantages of manufacture which no
other process does. It enables whole-meal
to be made into good bread by one step, an
advantage exclusively its own ; and should
the day ever unfortunately come when, in
this country, the finer kinds of flour were
not generally obtainable, that is to say, if
the people had ever to depend for the staff
of life on coarser flours than the white flours
now usually sold, the Dauglish system
would be soon recognized as the only one
fitted to meet the emergency with effective-
ness and economy.
CHAPTER III.
MANUFACTURE OF BREAD BY FERMENTATION.
fOR the sake of making the reader
fully acquainted with the distinc-
tive character of the Dauglish
process for the manufacture of
bread, it will be well to give, in a short
chapter, the method by fermentation which
it is intended to supersede.
One of the tersest and best descriptions
of the fermentation process with which I am
acquainted, is that supplied by Mr. John
Bennett, who was for many years the secre-
tary of the London Co-operative Bakers'
Association, in the Report to the Secretary
of State relative to the grievances complained .
of by journeymen bakers, published in 1862.
Bennett worked as an operative baker for
2
i8
upwards of thirty years, and I prefer to
follow his description, with the exception of
a few details, to any that I could furnish
from my own observation, although I have
been a witness to the procedure many times,
and have before me many notes upon it,
taken at the time of observation.
STEP THE FIRST.
The first process, Bennett tells us, for
making bread on the large scale, as for con-
sumption in London, consists in producing the
"ferment," which is usually done from eleven
to twelve o'clock in the day. It takes about
ten minutes to do it.
The mixture, or ferment, is made as
follows :
Potatoes in the proportion of one pound
and a half to the bushel of flour, or nine
pounds to a sack of flour, the sack holding
six bushels, weighing altogether two hundred
and eighty pounds are first boiled and then
mashed in a tub. Two quarts of hot water
are added, and the mash is well stirred.
When the mixture of water and of potatoes
is complete, cold water is added, until the
whole is cooled down to 80 Fahr. After
BREAD BY FERMENTATION. 19
this, yeast one quart of brewer's yeast is the
usual quantity is mixed up with the mash
in the tub, and about two pounds of flour are
added (that is to feed the yeast), and the
whole covered over and allowed to stand
from six to seven hours. If what jis called
" patent yeast " is used, the water that is
added to the mash is left at from 90 to 100
Fr., instead of 80. The mixture is called
the ferment. It ferments to a "head," and
then falls once, and sometimes twice. It is
ready for use when the fermentation has
ceased.
STEP THE SECOND.
At about five or six in the evening the
"' ferment" is ready to be mixed with one-
fourth part of the flour which is to be made
into the bread. This is commonly called
" setting the sponge." The admixture is
usually made with the arms of the workman,
water being added in sufficient quantity, from
seven to eight gallons to make " the sponge."
If one sack of flour (200 Ibs.) is used, it will
take one man from a quarter of an hour to
twenty minutes to complete the admixture.
Two men would do two sacks in about half
20 MANUFACTURE OF
an hour, or three sacks in about three-
quarters of an hour. " It is very hard work."
The " sponge " remains from five or six in
the evening until about midnight, in order
to undergo the process of fermentation. It
rises the first time in about four hours, then
it falls. It rises a second time in about three-
quarters of an hour to an hour afterwards.
Between these hours of setting the sponge
and completing the fermentation the working
baker gets most 'of his night's sleep.
STEP THE THIRD.
So soon as the sponge is ready the remain-
ing three-fourths of the flour which is to be
made into bread is added, and the w T orkman
proceeds to mix the added flour with the
sponge, with more water, and with about
three pounds of common salt. The water
now added is about eight gallons, the whole
quantity of water required for every stage of
the process of making bread from the finest
flour being sixteen gallons to the sack of
two hundred and eighty pounds' weight.
The term used in the trade, according to
Bennett, is not " kneading," as is commonly
BREAD BY FERMENTATION. 21
supposed, but " making the dough," although
it is really a kneading process. It takes one
man about three-quarters of an hour to make
a sack of five bushels into dough. This is
the hardest work which the journeyman has
to do. The sack of flour weighing two
hundred and eighty pounds turns out a yield
of ninety-one loaves, of four pounds each,
after standing twenty-four hours.
" After the dough is made it stands,
according to the kind of yeast used, or
whether the weather be hot or cold, from
half an hour to two hours ; " shorter if the
yeast used be of best quality and the weather
be warm, and viee versa.
During this interval, Mr. Bennett states,
the journeymen first take some refreshment,
which they call their breakfast, and then lie
down in their clothes upon the boards. They
spread a sack or two upon the boards, and
put a tin under their heads for a pillow, some-
times with a sack folded upon it, sometimes
without. These " boards " are the boards
on which the dough is weighed out, and then
moulded into the form of the loaf before it is
placed in the oven. The tin is the baking
tin for the " tinned bread."
22 MANUFACTURE OF
STEP THE FOURTH.
The journeymen, when they get up from
the boards, about two in the morning, proceed
to weigh off the pieces of dough, which are
put aside as they are weighed. When all
the dough is weighed off, the process of
moulding the loaves commences, and the loaves
are put into the oven as fast as they are
moulded. The boards on which the bread is
weighed and moulded are scraped and brushed
every time they are used, and many masters
have them washed once a week ; but the
moisture left from washing has a tendency,
in the opinion of some masters, to make the
bread sour.
STEP THE FIFTH.
From two to three in the morning until
five the bread remains in the oven, where it
is exposed to a temperature of 400. There
it passes through the process of complete
cooking, with the formation of crust. The
bread is withdrawn, and the process of its
manufacture is completed. It is set aside to
cool, and after a short time it is ready for
delivery.
BREAD BY FERMENTATION. 23
COMMENT ON THE FERMENTATION PROCESS.
The fermentation process of bread manu-
facture is, as will be seen from the above,
a slow and elaborate chemical procedure,
requiring much manual labour, care, and en-
durance. It can scarcely be called a cleanly
process, because by necessity it brings the
workmen more closely than is pleasant into
personal contact with the materials which they
are transforming into food. Be the workmen
ever so cleanly, they are still performing a
part which it would be well to relieve them
from if the relief were possible, an idea which
the least fastidious persons would speedily
realize if they could only see how, in the
various steps of its manufacture, the bread
.which comes to their tables, after the fer-
mented process, is turned out from stage to
stage.
It might be expected that Mr. Bennett's
description, good as a history of what was
going on in the baking trade twenty-two
years ago, was altogether out of date in these
days, when sanitation has made such striking
headway, and when the word health is as
common in every one's mouth as I myself or
24 MANUFACTURE OF BREAD.
any other health reformer could wish it to
be. I regret, however, to be obliged to state
that this expectation is not realized. There
is, I believe, no occupation in which so few
improvements of a sanitary kind have been
generally introduced. In the large majority
of bakeries the ancient errors still prevail, as
a quite recent investigation has most clearly
shown, nor is it likely that many of the more
serious errors can be reformed while yeast is
employed as the generator of the carbonic
acid by fermentation, and while a sponge
must be set for every batch of bread that
has to be produced.
Beyond these faults, there are others which
can scarcely be avoided. In order to meet
the irregularities of fermentation, which are
incident to varying qualities of flours, alum
or other substances have to be employed to
regulate the fermenting process. This will
be more fully indicated in a future chapter.
CHAPTER IV.
THE COURSE OF DISCOVERY TOWARDS THE
MANUFACTURE OF AERATED BREAD.
E are led now to the modification in
the method of making bread which
was introduced in a practical form
by Dr. Dauglish, and to which the
name of the aerated process has been given,
and to the product of which the term " aerated
bread " has been applied.
The distinguishing term very aptly defines
what is meant. The bread turned out by
the aerated process is not subjected to any
method by which carbonic acid gas is pro-
duced from the action of a ferment. The
, necessary impregnation with gas is effected
by forcing carbonic acid, made by a pure
chemical procedure, into the mixture of flour
26 THE COURSE OF DISCOVERY
and water without any intermediate ferment-
ing stage.
It is not claimed for Dauglish that he
conceived originally the idea of making'
bread by this direct method.
In order to get at the root of the process
we must go back to the labours of the illus-
trious Joseph Priestley, who in the last century,
in his famous researches with fixed air, since
called carbonic acid gas, found that this gas
could be held by water, and from that circum-
stance invented the plan of impregnating
water with the gas and producing aerated
waters.
This curious and valuable discovery had
the most important influences in various
ways. Indirectly it led to the compression
of gases. Directly it led to the commercial
introduction of aerated drinks and of aerated
bread. It has yet to lead to other discoveries,
perhaps still more remarkable.
Dauglish himself, in his valuable evidence
before Mr. Tremenhere, refers to those au-
thorities who, previously to him, had thought
of the same subject, namely, to Professor John- .
ston, Professor of Chemistry in the University
of Durham, who published a paper on the sub-
TOWARDS AERATED BREAD. 27
ject in 1847 5 to an anonymous physician, who
wrote a pamphlet in the year 1846, entitled
" Instructions for Making Unfermented
Bread"; and tc the great chemist, Professor
Thomas Thomson, formerly Professor of
Chemistry in the University of Glasgow, who
in 1 8 1 6 showed that the only purpose secured
by fermentation in bread-making is the gene-
ration of the carbonic acid required to raise
the dough, an end that could be attained
by the use of carbonate of soda and muriatic
acid, by which the waste consequent on
fermentation would be largely saved.
The claim that has to be made for Daug-
lish is that he practically discovered the mode
by which carbonic acid could, under pressure,
be introduced in water to the flour, and so act
on the flour as to make it become a light
dough, as if it had been leavened. Even
here we cannot say that he had not been to
some extent anticipated in conception, al-
though he did not know the fact at the time
of his invention.
There was an inventor by the name of
Luke Hebert, who in 1836 brought out a
patent for manufacturing bread by machinery,
in which aerated water, charged with car-
28 THE COURSE OF DISCOVERY
bonic acid, was the agent used for raising the
dough. Hebert, like Dr. Dauglish, was an
enthusiast on the subject of aerated bread ;
and he set forth the value of his invention
in language rarely met with in the terms
and specifications of a patent. The manu-
facture of bread, he says, surpasses all others
in extent, but hitherto it has not been treated
as a manufacture ; the homely and unscien-
tific practices of past ages remain in all their
pristine impurity and wastefulness. To please
the eye, the most nutritive and agreeable
properties of the wheat are partially destroyed
or deteriorated. To economize and purify
the "staff of life" appears to have been an
object either unworthy of the attention or
degrading to the study of philosophers or
mechanics, while that of a candlewick and
numerous other " trifles light as air " have
been the objects of much elaborate investi-
gation and of public patronage. He then
declares, as a fact capable of demonstration,
that the present system of supplying the
public with bread is equivalent to an un-
necessary tax upon the people of these
kingdoms of fifteen millions annually, the
whole of that enormous sum being swallowed
TO WA RDS A ERA TED BREA D. 29
up in wasteful processes and needless com-
mercial operations.
In Hebert's process the whole of the
rendering of corn into bread was performed
in one place, and at one time. He essayed
to be miller and baker in combination in one
manufactory. The grain was delivered into
the receiving room of the manufactory, where
it was examined and weighed. This done,
it was hoisted through a shaft, charged with
warm air, into a room at the top of the build-
ing, and delivered on a creeper to any part
of the several garners. When the wheat was
required it was allowed to run down into the
clearing and drying room for the purpose of
being sifted, screened, and prepared. Then
it was made to descend into the cooling and
grinding garners. After the grain was
ground and dressed, the flour it had yielded
was raised into the flour garners, the offal
being distributed into sacks to be carried
away.
For converting the flour into bread, it
was first mixed with the requisite quantity of
finely-ground salt, and then put into hoppers
which served the twofold purpose of measur-
ing the quantity and of conducting the flour
3 o THE COURSE OF DISCOVERY
into the mixing and kneading apparatus.
This department of mixing and kneading
was not conducted in the ordinary wasteful
manner, by fermentation, but was entirely
superseded by the immediate and direct
application to the flour of water highly
impregnated with carbonic acid gas and
atmospheric air. The impregnation and
kneading being quickly completed, the dough
was made to descend an inclined plane on to
a " making up table " situated on the charging
and discharging apparatus of the ovens. As
fast as the loaves were made up they were
placed upon a heated cast-iron pan, which
gradually advanced into the oven until the
pan became filled and the oven completely
charged.
It may be stated, in general terms, that in
the above description, from Hebert's patent
the leading principle in the manufacture of
aerated bread is supplied. It does not seem
that the plan was a successful one in Hebert's
hands, and it very soon died out. In fact
while the principle was, in the main, correct,
the mode of operation was so deficient in
detail it could never have been made a success
as it originally stood. The one suggestion of
TOWARDS AERATED BREAD. 31
casting the dough, after it had been made,
down a shaft to a " making up table" was
alone sufficient to ruin it as a working scheme.
In that act the whole of the preliminary work
of making a good loaf was missed. So soon
as the dough was liberated from the mixing
and kneading reservoir, and splashed down
upon the mixing table, the gas with which
the dough had been impregnated would be
set at liberty, and the mass left become a
heavy paste which, in the oven, could not rise
to make a bread that was likely to be
popular.
Perhaps if Hebert's invention, in which
he tells us he had the assistance of some
foreigner living abroad, had been brought
into practice on a large scale, the faults in it
would have been detected and amended. As
it was, the system remained to be accom-
plished by the inventive skill of Dauglish.
CHAPTER V.
THE ORIGINAL DAUGLISH PROCESS.
|R. DAUGLISH, in an original paper
read before the Society of Arts in
1860, described with great perspi-
cuity the principles carried out in his
process. It had long been known to chemists,
he observed, that water will absorb its own
bulk of carbonic acid, whatever the density,
with great readiness, when agitated with it.
Thus, if a bottle be half filled with pure water
and half with pure gas, and if at a tempera-
ture of 62 Fahr. the bottle be closed and the
water and gas be freely agitated together,
so much absorption of gas will take place
that the barometric pressure within the bottle
will have fallen from the natural atmospheric
pressure of thirty inches of mercury to fifteen
THE ORIGINAL DA UGLISH PROCESS. 33
inches. The gas will be immediately diffused
through or absorbed by the water, until there
is an exact balance between the quantity of
gas held in solution by one cubic foot of
water and that contained in each cubic foot
of space within the bottle not occupied by the
water ; and as this law of absorption is per-
sistent at all pressures, by increasing the
density of the gas the quantity absorbed by
the water will be increased in an equal ratio ;
and so long as the water is retained under
the pressure due to the density, so long will
it hold the gas in solution, but whenever it is
released from the pressure the gas will escape
from it with effervescence.
This simple rule explained, Dauglish
proceeds to illustrate that if water, holding in
solution the necessary quantity of carbonic
acid gas, could be used to incorporate with
flour in the preparation of dough, without
any of the gas being allowed to escape from
it until the dough is fully formed, but then
be allowed to escape, it would cause the
formation of the necessary minute bubbles
of gas, which would distend the dough into a
perfect sponge, even more perfect than that
which is obtained by fermentation, since
3
34 THE ORIGINAL DA UGLISH PROCESS.
every atom of water would yield its atom of
gas, not only between the particles of starch
and their gluten coat, but also within the
substance of the coat itself, rendering that
porous.
By taking advantage of these facts, Daug-
lish proceeded successfully. He made an
arrangement by which he brought together,
in a closed apparatus, the flour, out of which
the dough was to be made, and water super-
saturated with the carbonic acid gas. He
incorporated the flour with the water and gas
under pressure, and when the incorporation
was complete, the mixture was drawn off,
when it expanded into a spongy mass, and
produced a dough perfect in character, and
ready for the oven.
By this simple method, he, so to speak,
"set the sponge" without any of the cumbrous
processes connected with fermentation to
which reference has been made in a former
chapter.
This, he adds, is the new process of bread-
making.
It will be felt, as the above description is
read, that there is no material difference
between this mode of manufacture and that
THE ORIGINAL DA UGLISH PROCESS. 35
proposed by Mr. Luke Hebert. Without
doubt, the general principle was the same,
but the details were so different that Daug-
lish's plan was as successful as Hebert' s was
unsuccessful.
In the first place, Dauglish's method of
mixing was much superior ; but the greatest
improvement consisted in the mode in which
the dough was made into loaves ready for
the oven.
It will be remembered that Hebert, by
his method, let the dough pass direct from
the mixer on to a slab or table where it was
made by hand into a loaf, or transferred into
a tin, much to the loss of the carbonic acid
and to the spoiling of the dough.
Dauglish by his plan caught the dough as
it was leaving the mixer ready for the oven.
By the pressure in the mixer the dough was
forced through a nozzle or mouth, and as it
expanded or rose in^the act of leaving the
nozzle it was ready to be baked. The grand
secret of success was included in this simple
and practical contrivance.
The brief description of the apparatus, as
it left his hands, is given by its inventor in
his own words, in the orginal paper read-
36 THE ORIGINAL DAUGLISH PROCESS.
before the Society of Arts. It runs as
follows :
The apparatus essentially consists of a
gasholder, and a generator, similar in con-
struction and principle to, but larger in size
than, what are used by the makers of aerated
waters ; of pumps suitable for pumping elastic
fluids ; and of a mixing vessel, and a water
vessel in connection, both made so that they
can be tightly closed to sustain an internal
pressure of from one hundred to two hundred
pounds on the square inch. The mixing
vessel is supplied with flour through a shoot
which passes from the floor above. The
water-vessel is supplied with water through
a pipe which comes from a large cistern at
the top of the building.
The mixer is capable of being closed per-
fectly tight, and is opened by means of a
proper mechanical contrivance, with the
greatest facility. One,, man in a few seconds
can both close and open.
The order of working, and the time re-
quired for making a sack of flour of two
hundred and eighty pounds into dough, are
as follows. The time is rather over than
under stated.
THE ORIGINAL DAUGLISH PROCESS. 37
Opening lid of mixer and fitting within the
neck the end of flour-shoot and turning
water-cock to fill water-vessel . . i minute.
Passing from top of machine to floor above
and shooting down a sack of flour . . 3 minutes.
Returning, closing water-cock, removing
end of shoot, and closing mixer . . 2
Withdrawing atmospheric air from mixer
Pumping gas through water into mixers
Mixing ......
Total .
3
10
7
26
At the end of this time the dough is
ready to be drawn into loaves from a nozzle
or mouth, through which it is forced by the
pressure within the mixer ; and as it expands
or rises in the act of leaving the mouth it is
ready to be baked immediately. One boy is
capable of drawing the dough from one sack
of flour into loaves in fifteen minutes, as fast
as they can be weighed and placed in the
oven.
Thus, in the short space of twenty-six
minutes, which is subject to no variation, the
baker can always rely upon having his dough
ready for the oven, and this with a certainty,
when the labour is well organised, which is
38 THE ORIGINAL DA UGLISH PROCESS.
nearly mathematical. To these facts he
added in a subsequent essay the following :
A bakery capable of converting two sacks
of flour per hour into bread, would, by work-
ing ten hours continuously out of twenty-
four, convert twenty sacks per day, or one
hundred and twenty sacks per week, or
allowing for contingencies say one hundred
sacks per week, or working with two sets
of workmen for twenty hours out of twenty-
four, double that quantity, say two hun-
dred sacks per week. Such a bakery could
be built and fitted with plant and machinery
ready for work for from ,1,500 to ; 1,700.
Land and patent licence would be extra.
A bakery with half the manufacturing
capacity of the above would cost between
^"800 and ^900.
A small bakery, fitted with machinery and
plant for converting half a sack of flour at a
time, and suitable for a baker doing about
twenty sacks per week, could be fitted,
exclusive of building and ovens, for about
,250.
The process was originally described by
another and independent observer in the
subsequent account.
THE ORIGINAL DA UGL1SH PROCESS. 39
The principle involved, like that in most
good mechanical contrivances, is extremely
simple. Taking advantage of the well-known
capacity of water for absorbing carbonic acid,
whatever its destiny, in quantities equal to its
own bulk, Dr. Dauglish first prepares the
water which is to be used in forming the
dough, by placing it within a strong vessel,
and forcing carbonic acid gas into it by the
aid of a pump put in motion by a small steam-
engine.
The gas is formed by the action of pure
sulphuric acid upon chalk, placed within the
vessel. The gas is subsequently washed by
passing it through water, and ascends into
a gasometer, from which it is pumped, as
occasion requires, into vessels, within which
it is combined, under a pressure of about
100 Ibs. on the square inch, with the water,
which absorbs it without any appreciable in-
crease in bulk, and, of course, retains the gas
so long as it is kept under pressure, and not
one moment longer. The flour, and salt in
the form of brine, are conveyed by a shoot
and a tube into a hemispherical vessel. As
soon as the necessary quantity has been
introduced, the valve is closed through which
40 THE ORIGINAL DA UGLISH PROCESS.
the flour entered. A cock is turned, and a
measured quantity of aerated water admitted,
or rather forced, by high pressure, into the
hemispherical vessel. A system of knives
rotating within, effectually kneads the mass.
After a little time, a dough-tap, as it is called,
is opened, and the contents of the vessel
expelled in a continuous stream by the pres-
sure within. Here it is that the remarkable
part of the process occurs.
The closed vessels, the gasometers, and
the pump, have only been means to one end.
As the mass leaves the tap it expands, by
virtue of the escape of the gas imprisoned in
the water the instant before, into dough,
which is cut off by an attendant, weighed,
and transmitted to the oven without coming
in contact with the human hand for even a
second.
CHAPTER VI.
THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS.
|N the quarter of a century during
which the Dauglish process of bread
manufacture has now been in practi-
cal operation, many improvements
in details have been introduced. The present
chairman of the Aerated Bread Company
has paid much attention to improvements in
details, both before and since Dr. Dauglish's
death, and to his scientific skill and perse-
verance we are indebted for several practical
advancements.
I propose in the present chapter to explain
the latest developments of the Dauglish
design. For this purpose I shall proceed in
the most elementary manner, step by step,
so that every reader may follow me.
42 THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS.
STEP I.
In the factory they begin, practically, with
the manufacture of the carbonic dioxide, com-
monly known as carbonic acid gas. As this
last name, carbonic acid, is that with which
the public is most familiar, I shall, in spite of
its being rather antiquated, keep to it.
Five cubic feet of carbonic acid are required
to charge thirty-five gallons of water, for
every two sacks, or five hundred and sixty
poundSj of flour. This is sufficient for four
hundred portions of two pounds and a quarter
each of dough, and for four hundred two-
pound loaves of aerated bread.
There is nothing that calls for special
notice in regard to the production of the
carbonic acid gas. The gas is made in the
usual way, as it is made for the manufacture
of the artificial aerated waters, is collected,
thoroughly well washed, and stored for use.
The utmost care is bestowed in washing the
gas, so that it may be freed from every source
of impurity ; and a special apparatus has been
constructed for this purpose. The receiver
in which the gas is evolved is called the
generator ; the apparatus in which it is
THE MODERN AERA TED PROCESS. 43
washed is called the washer, and the re-
ceptacle in which it is stored is called the
reservoir.
The gas passes from the generator into
the washer, a series of vessels in which it is
thoroughly cleansed by water purification.
From the washer it passes into the reservoir,
or reservoirs, which hold it ready for use.
Originally the reservoirs were constructed
after the old fashion of a series of large gas-
holders. These having been found incon-
venient, and expensive to keep in order, have
been superseded by a set of large strong
impermeable bags, as reservoirs, which are
suspended from the ceiling, and which, as the
gas is drawn from them, collapse. In these
convenient reservoirs a plentiful supply of
gas is always kept on hand.
The gas drawn from the reservoirs is
pumped by a steam pump into the water
column or cylinder, in which it is condensed.
Each water column, or cylinder, is filled with
forty-one gallons of water at ordinary temper-
ature, and the gas is condensed in it under a
pressure of twenty-six pounds to the square
inch. The water so charged is now ready
to be applied for raising the dough.
44 THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS.
STEP II.
In the original process the flour that had
to be made into bread was submitted to the
action of the super-aerated water by direct
transference into what will by-and-bye be
described as the "mixer." It was found >
however, in practice, that much difficulty
occurred in making the gas admix readily
with the flour and water. Great pressure
was required, and the mixer, with all the
tubes and taps connected with it, was ex-
posed each time to considerable strain. To
lessen these difficulties a plan has been in-
troduced, called the wine-whey modification.
In observing the behaviour of water and
carbonic acid on flour, it was observed that if
a weak wine-whey were added to the flour
with the aerated water, the paste, or dough,
which resulted was more easily aerated than
if water alone were used. The water diluted
with the wine-whey held more carbonic acid
in solution, and the gluten of the flour,
softened by the mixture, allowed a more
equable and effective distention of the dough
by the gas. Thus much pressure was saved
in the process of aeration.
THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS. 45
One hundred pounds pressure on the square
inch was reduced to twenty-six pounds.
In order to carry out the wine-whey
diluting process, a vat placed in the upper
story of the factory is charged with a portion
of malt and flour, and these are mashed and
allowed to ferment until a weak and very
slightly acid thin wine is produced. This
fluid is cooled by passing over a series of
cooling surfaces, and then is stored for use
until it becomes transformed into a vinous-
whey. From the store holding the whey a
tube descends, which can be made to com-
municate with the water cylinder in which the
process of "aeration is carried out.
Each cylinder holds, as we have seen, forty-
one gallons of fluid, and into it, when it is
about to be charged, eight gallons of the whey
are introduced to twenty-nine of water. When
the admixture is complete the gas is let in,
and the mixture is ready for aeration.
To aerate the mixture of wine-whey and
water, the gas from the reservoirs is pumped
by the steam pump from the elastic reser-
voirs into the cylinder, at a pressure of
twenty-six pounds to the square inch, as
indicated by the pressure-gauge. Charged
46 THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS.
completely at the pressure named, the fluid is
ready for use, and the second step is completed.
STEP III.
We come now to the process to which the
two steps immediately preceding are pre-
liminary. We have to understand how the
flour is converted into dough by aeration.
Let us suppose that two sacks, or five
hundred and sixty pounds, of flour, sufficient
to make four hundred loaves of bread of two
pounds weight each, have to be produced.
In the factory there are, projecting from
the first floor, a series of pear-shaped iron
chambers, called mixers. The mixers are
strongly girded so as to be able to bear the
pressure from within. They are formed in
three pieces, and they are lined over their
interior surface with a very pure white hard
enamel, which can be cleansed like porcelain.
The upper portion of the mixer, or upper
neck, projects a little through the floor to
which it is suspended, into the story above.
Here it is armed with a cover, which can be
removed, replaced, and screwed down.
The lower and narrower portion of the
mixer, the part which corresponds to the
THE MODERN AERATED PROCESS. 47
stem part of the pear, to which the mixer has
been likened in respect to shape, ends in a
neck, to which is connected a valve opening,
which is capable of being closed and opened
by a long lever, the arms of which extend on
each side the neck of the mixer. Within the
mixer are arms which rotate on an axis passing
through the upper part, and are worked by an
engine after the neck of the mixer has been
hermetically closed. The arms by their
motion cause admixture within the mixer.
By a small tube the mixer is connected
with the cylinder of aerated fluid.
All being ready for work, the two sacks
of flour are brought along the floor of the
chamber in which the upper mouth of the
mixer is situated, the mixer is opened there,
the flour is poured in, the opening is closed,
the tap leading from the cylinder of aerated
fluid is turned on so as to allow the aerated
fluid to enter, and by the action of the arms
v/ithin the mixer the flour and the fluid are
completely incorporated.
When the incorporation is complete the
valve in the lower or pear-shaped neck of
the mixer is opened by a sharp movement of
the lever, and the precise quantity of dough
48 THE MODERN AERA TED PROCESS.
for a single loaf of bread is forced out under
the pressure of the gas. By a reverse move-
ment of the lever the dough is cut off, and
falls into a baking tin which passes under-
neath on a sliding platform. The dough is
then conveyed to the oven, where it is
converted into bread.
The rapidity with which this process is
carried out is one of the most striking of its
many advantages. A few weeks since, I
minuted the time that was, leisurely, taken
for converting two sacks of flour into portions
of dough for four hundred two-pound loaves.
From the time when the aeration of the
water was commenced to the time that all the
dough was tinned and in the oven, a period of
forty minutes, only, was required.
In the preparation of the dough by the
fermentation method, a period of about ten
hours would have been required.
And, throughout, everything was effected
by perfectly pure machinery, and with the
precision of the most perfectly-acting machine.
CHAPTER VII.
WHEAT BREAD AND FLOURS.
E are brought to a point where we
may study the changes which take
place in the various steps of the
processes described in the two
last chapters.
If we take a grain of wheat and divide it
into two halves from top to bottom, and look
at the section with a magnifying glass, we see
three distinct forms of structure.
All round the outside we see five layers of
flat cells, which look like coverings or skins.
Within them there is a layer of square cells
which, when the grain is moist, are filled with
a glutinous fluid.
Within these again, and filling up the body
of the grain, are large numbers of many-sided
cells containing starchy material.
4
50 WHEAT BREAD AND FLOURS.
In this section of a wheat grain, we see
all that is necessary for the support of animal
life, except the proper quantity of water.
In the dried wheat there is per cent.
Of food for building up the) Flesh-forming 13-6
tissues of the body . . /Mineral . 17
I5-3
Of heat-producing, for ani-] Starch . . . 69*0
mating, life-giving force jFat ... 1-2
70*2
Of water 14*5
lOO'O
The various kinds of food here named are
laid up in the grain of wheat in the following
manner.
The mineral food combined with the dry
part or husk, and with a little albuminous or
tissue-forming food, cerealine, lies in the outer
layers of the grain.
The chief part of the tissue-forming food,
in the form of gluten, sometimes called
" crude " gluten, is laid up in the square cells
of the grain. The heat-producing food is
laid up in the many-sided cells in the body of
the grain, and consists of the basis of all the
heat-giving foods, starch with a small quan-
tity of fat.
WHEA T BREA D A ND FLOURS. 51
The water is enclosed or rather diffused in
the grain, chiefly in combination with the
flesh or tissue-forming substance.
The whole of the requirements of food are
here presented in wheat grain, in so far as
quality is concerned, but not in correct relation
to quantity. The proportions are not such
as would enable life to be healthily supported
as it would be on milk. In milk the propor-
tions per cent, are :
Food for building up the ] ; Flesh-forming 4-92
tissues of the body . . j Mineral . 070
- 5-62
Heat-producing food, for]
animating, life-giving force} ^'5
Water ............ 86-88
- 86-88
lOO'OO
If then we strike a comparison between the
two foods we shall find that in comparison
with milk as a standard food, wheat is at fault
in the following proportions.
Wheat. Milk.
Flesh foods .... 13-6 4-92
Mineral foods ... 17 0-70
Heat foods .... 69-0 7-50
Water 14-5 86 -88
52 WHEA T BREAD AND FL O URS.
Wheat therefore is a standard food as re-
gards qualities, but not as regards quantities.
When, however, wheat has been ground into
flour and made into bread it is capable, if all
of it be used, of supplying, with the addition
of water as drink, what is sufficient to sup-
port life under circumstances favourable to
existence. In other words, a person can
manage to live on bread and water, if the
bread contain all the food principles of the
grain.
I have spoken here about wheat in its
entire form as wheat, that is to say, contain-
ing all the natural constituents. But before
wheat is turned into bread, it is subjected to
the process of grinding into flour, and in that
process the different parts of the wheat are
considerably modified according to the method
that is followed.
ON THE VALUES OF WHEATEN FLOURS USED
FOR BREAD.
I have several times spoken of flours used
for bread manufacture, and I ought, before I
proceed further, to define them more dis-
tinctly than has yet been done.
It is usual in ordinary conversation to
WHEA T BREA D AND FLO URS. 53
speak of " firsts," " seconds," and " thirds "
in relation to flours, as if it were possible to
go to a baker's or a miller's and order, dis-
tinctively, flours of three known values firsts,
as better and dearer than seconds ; seconds,
as better and dearer than thirds. In such a
notion there is considerable error, in this day
at all events, whatever may have been the
case in an earlier time. At present we have
in 'the food market, practically, the following
classes. I have specimens of each variety
before me as I write, supplied to me by
a well-known miller, and I will explain from
them what is in the market as flour food.
Whites Flour.
There is a form of flour which most people
would call firsts, but which in the mill is
called " whites" This flour when it is made
from English wheat is derived from the best
and whitest kind of wheat. * In this flour the
wheat has been reduced to the finest powder,
and the outer portion of the wheat grain has
been carefully sifted away. The flour con-
sists of the dried gluten, not the whole of
it, but a considerable portion, and of the
interior or starchy part in full complement.
54 WHEA T BREA D A ND FL URS.
This constitutes No. i, white flour. From
this flour the finest white bread is made. It
is against the general use of this flour, that
the Bread Reform League has protested.
Fine Middlings.
There is another form of flour called, com-
monly, fine middlings ftotir, or sometimes
seconds flour. This flour is usually produced
from English wheat. It is derived from what
is technically known as red wheat ; or it is pro-
duced from a rather inferior class of English
wheat ; or, again, it is produced from imper-
fect foreign wheats. It differs from " whites"
or "firsts" in matter of colour. It is of
darker colour, and it produces a darker and
often a softer or more doughy bread, but it
does not differ from the whiter flour by
having in it the external part of the wheat
grain. It is, like the whiter flour, composed
of the gluten and starch chiefly ; but some-
times it contains more soluble albuminous
substance than the finer variety, and for that
reason it does not yield so firm and elastic a
sponge, or so firm and crisp a bread.
Coarse Middlings.
There is a third kind of flour which is
WHEA T BREA D AND FL O URS. 55
called "coarse middlings," or "sharps" and
which consists of a coarse flour or meal. It is
sometimes called also "coarse" or "bran"
flour, because it has a coarse, dark appear-
ance, with evidences of bran, finely ground,
dispersed through it. In this flour there
remains a great part of the external layers
of the wheat grain.
Whole Meal.
There is a fourth variety of wheat, to
which the name of "whole meal" has been
applied, and about which a great deal has
been spoken and written during these last
two years, and towards the value of which, as
an article of food, Miss Yates has rendered
such excellent service. The whole meal
flour contains everything belonging to the
wheat grain except the most outer parts of
the grain, the hard woody portions, which,
being indigestible and irritating, do not admit
of being taken as food.
Gramilar Decorticated Flour.
An improvement on the ordinary whole
meal flour has been recently introduced in
the decorticated or granulated flour, which
Dr. Morfit has done much to perfect. In
56 WHEA T BREA D AND FLO URS.
the decorticated whole meal, the extreme
outer coating of the wheat grain is removed,
in the first instance, by a special process of
abrading, and then the whole of the grain is
reduced to flour.
The decorticated whole meal flour contains
the entire edible food of the wheat the
mineral food, the soluble albuminoids, the
fibrin, the starch, and all the derivatives
from the starchy base. It is not so white
a flour as the " whites," not, perhaps, so
white as the household flour or the seconds ;
but it is claimed for it that it is the perfect
flour, containing in itself all the nourishment
which wheat can supply, and yielding, there-
fore, a perfect bread for life-sustaining
purposes.
Another kind of flour derived from wheat
and I have nothing to do in this work
with any other grain than wheat is called
" high ground flour." The flour thus defined
is not ground between stones, but crushed.
It contains all the constituents of the wheat
grain except the bran, and in many respects
resembles the decorticated or granulated
wheat flour.
In estimating the value of these different
WHEA T BREAD AND FL O URS. 57
flours, we must consider what it is we want
to recommend in the way of bread for the
bread consumer before we give an opinion.
If we want a white loaf, if we wish to supply
a loaf in which the process of yeast fermen-
tation has been carried out in its production
on the steadiest principle of working, we
must commend the flour called "whites" or
firsts. If we want a loaf of a similar kind,
but less white and of cheaper quality, then
we must commend the " household flour " or
" seconds." If we want a loaf which has
in it all the nutrient material for bone, muscle,
brain, as well as for working power, then we
must insist on whole meal.
CHAPTER VIII.
FERMENTATION AND AERATION. A CONTRAST.
CHANGES DURING FERMENTATION.
HE flours above named, when sub-
jected to the fermentation process
in order to be turned into bread,
are somewhat differently acted
upon according to their quality or character.
To understand the changes properly, it is
best to begin with the fine wheat flour from
which the bran has been removed, because,
for reasons which will become plain as the
description progresses, in this flour the
fermentation is steadiest and most reliable.
CHANGES DURING THE FIRST STEP.
The object of mixing together potatoes,
yeast, and flour in the first step (see page 1 8)
is to produce a fermenting basis. In boiling
FERMENTA TIGN A ND A ERA TION 59
the potatoes, which are rich in starch, the
starch granules are broken through, and the
yeast is allowed to reach the starch enclosed
in the walls of the cells. If the starch cells
were not broken, the yeast would not produce
its effect of transforming the starch into a sub-
stance, which is necessary before a second
required change takes place. The warm
water is added to make an efficient mixture
of the ingredients. The flour is added, ac-
cording to the common saying, to feed the
yeast. The part which the flour plays is that
it assists the fermentation. In the flour there
exists, as already indicated, a portion of flesh-
forming substance called crude gluten, and
some other soluble albuminous substance.
Under the action of the yeast, aided by the
soluble albuminous substance, the broken-up
starch is attacked, and is partly converted into
dextrin and maltose and glucose sugars, with
formation of some carbonic acid, under the
influence of which " the rising or coming to a
head " is followed by the fall of the dough.
CHANGES DURING THE SECOND AND THIRD
STEPS.
During the second step, when the ferment
60 FERMEKTA T2ON A ND AERA TION.
is added to and mixed with the flour to form
the sponge (see pages 19-21), the fermenta-
tion is continued, more carbonic acid is pro-
duced by the fermentation, and the mass rises
and falls twice, as we have seen. Then when
the remaining flour, the salt, and the water are
added, the dough is formed, and in it, as pro-
ducts of fermentation, alcohol and carbonic acid
are diffused. By the action of the carbonic
acid the dough is raised or lightened.
The mode in which the dough is raised
under the action of the gas is very interesting.
The gas, it might be supposed, when thrown
off so freely, would simply force out its way
and escape, leaving a heavy or pasty sub-
stance behind. This is not the case. The
escape of the gas is interrupted by the
gluten, which, being thick and tenacious,
entangles it and is distended by it much as a
sponge is distended with water, from which
analogy the term " the sponge " is probably
taken.
The origin of the carbonic acid which
causes the rising of the dough is now well
understood. It comes from the primary and
secondary action of the ferment on the
starchy parts of the flour. In the primary
A CONTRAST. 61
steps, owing to the action of the heat and of
the ferments, the starch is converted into dex-
trin and sugars, maltose and glucose : next
under the influence of the yeast-ferment part
of these are converted into alcohol and car-
bonic acid.
The dough, which has by this time been
formed, consists then of gluten distended with
carbonic acid gas, like a sponge ; of starch,
changed into the soluble form by the action
of heat and the albuminous and yeast fer-
ments; of the salt that has been added during
the admixture ; of some saccharine princi-
ples ; of water and of a certain measure of
alcohol diffused through the water and through
the dough by the water. The carbonic acid
and the alcohol have been developed out of
the materials that have been used, that is,
out of the flour. Some of the albuminoid
parts of the flour have been broken up in
forwarding the process of fermentation; and
some of the starchy or amylaceous parts
of the flour have been broken up under
the effect of the yeast-ferment, in order to
furnish the carbonic acid, and the necessary
accompaniment of that acid, alcohol.
62 FERMENT A TION A ND AERA TION.
CHANGES IN THE FOURTH AND FIFTH
FERMENTATIVE STEPS.
In the fourth step (see page 22) nothing
occurs beyond the mechanical changes of
shape in the manufacture of the loaf, and the
continuance, in some degree, of fermentation.
In the fifth stage (see pages 22, 23), when
the loaf is exposed to the high temperature
in the oven, a new series of changes occurs.
The carbonic acid and the alcohol are driven
off from the dough ; a large quantity of
water is given off; an external crust is
formed, and the solid condition which specia-
lizes bread from dough is brought about.
The cellular structure seen in bread is the
indication of the distention to which the
structure has been subjected by the gas
during the fermentative ebullition.
THE AERATED PROCESS.
By the aerated process of making bread
all the destructive influence of fermentation
is prevented. There is no chemical decom-
position of the flour whatever, and therefore
no loss of material, while the rising of the
dough is just as effectively carried out. The
aerated bread contains, therefore, all the glu-
A CONTRAST. 63
ten and all the albuminous food of the wheat,
out of which the living tissues are constructed,
as well as the food which ministers to the
animal warmth and vital activity.
It is sometimes said by those who do not
understand the subject that the fermentative
is a mechanical, the aerated a chemical process.
The reverse is the fact. The manufacture of
bread by fermentation is a chemical process in
the strictest sense of the word. During the act
of fermentation the dough is a true laboratory,
in which carbonic acid and alcohol are made
on an extensive scale. The alcohol is finally
dissipated, but the carbonic acid is used for
the same intention as when it is diffused by
Dauglish's method from the reservoir. The
aerated process, except in so far as the prelimi-
narygenerationof carbonic acid is concerned, is
entirely a mechanical procedure, in and during
which the dough is, chemically, unaffected.
Owing to the circumstance that no chemical
change is produced by the aerated process,
the whole proceeding is rendered peculiarly
steady, efficient, and direct, without the inter-
vention of hand labour. Everything is carried
on with measured accuracy, the quality of the
flours used having no important bearing upon
64 FERMENTA TION A ND A ERA TION.
the process. This is a matter of very great
moment in respect both to the economy of the
manufacture and the quality of the product.
When the baker is producing bread by the
fermenting process, he is exposed to the
risk of exciting changes beyond what he
desires. The presence of a little excess of
the soluble albuminous ferments in his flour
obliges him to take measures for checking
an excess of fermentation. He therefore
resorts to different measures which experi-
ence has taught him are most effective. At
one time, in order to neutralise the deteriora-
tion which the gluten of flour undergoes by
keeping, and thereby to prevent rapidity of
fermentative changes, sulphate of copper was
sometimes added to the flour. The late Baron
Liebig, in 1855, suggested the addition of lime
in a state of solution without heat. After
having kneaded the flour with water and
lime-water, the baker, following Liebig's pro-
cess, added the yeast, and left the dough to
itself, supplying a remaining portion of flour
to the fermented dough at the proper time.
This, it was said, yielded an excellent elastic,
spongy bread, free from acid and of agree-
able taste. The proportions of flour and
A CONTRAST. 65
lime-water employed were in the ratio of
19 to 5 ; and as the quantity of liquid in
lime-water was not sufficient for converting
the flour into dough, a sufficiency of ordinary
water was added. The quantity of lime con-
tained in this bread was small, 160 ounces of
lime requiring more than 300 quarts of water
for solution, while the yield of bread was
thought to be improved. Nineteen pounds
of flour kneaded without lime-water gave
twenty-four and a-half pounds of bread ; the
same quantity of flour kneaded with five
quarts of added lime-water produced twenty-
six pounds six ounces of bread.
I name Liebig's process because it shows
that even great chemists had to devote their
attention to the losses entailed through fer-
mentation ; and this plan by the great German
chemist was probably the best of its kind,
but it did not at any time become very
popular.
The agent chiefly used in the bakeries has
been alum. The people think that alum is
employed to produce whiteness of bread.
That result, if obtained by it, is indirect.
The great advantage of alum is to check too
rapid fermentation, and it is added, practically,
5
66 PER MEN! A TION A ND A ERA TION.
in proportion as it is required for that intent.
Hence the inferior breads are more likely to
be charged with alum than those made from
the finer sorts of wheaten flour.
By the aerated process not one of these
chemical measures is ever demanded. Alum
would interfere seriously with the working of
the process, and render the production of a
good loaf, by aeration, impossible.
The contrast between the two processes,
fermentation and aeration, stands out prac-
tically best in the manufacture of whole meal
bread. The flour from which whole meal
bread is made contains an albuminous sub-
stance called cerealine. This albuminous
substance sets up, by the ordinary method
of manufacture, such rapid primary fer-
mentation that the secondary part of the
fermenting process, the production of the
sponge, is rendered nearly impossible. The
bread has, consequently, to be produced by
two processes of fermentation. A sponge has
first to be made out of white wheaten flour,
and the whole meal has next to be added,
the result being a loaf, which is really not of
whole meal, but a mixture of whole meal and
white meal.
A CONTRAST.
67
By the aerated process no such complicate
proceeding is at all required. The whole
meal is put at once, like the finest flour, into
the mixer ; it is there directly brought into
combination with the carbonic acid con-
densed in the water, and, by the one act,
the dough is transformed into a condition fit
for the oven. There are thus secured three
economies, one of labour, a second of time,
a third of material.
CHAPTER IX.
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY ADVANTAGES TO THE
WORKMEN BY THE AERATED SYSTEM OF
BREAD MANUFACTURE.
was of opinion that the
advantages of his system of bread
manufacture might be summed up
under the following heads :
1. It does away entirely with fermentation
and with all those chemical changes which,
in the constituents of the flour, are con-
sequent upon it.
2. It avoids the loss consequent upon the
decomposition of the portion of starch or
glucose consumed in the process of fer-
mentation, a loss of from 3 to 6 per cent.,
which he estimated as of about the value of
,5,000,000 in the total quantity of bread
made, annually, in the United Kingdom.
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY ADVANTAGES. 6<;
3. It reduces the time required to prepare
a batch of dough from a period of from eight
to ten hours to less than thirty minutes.
4. Its results are absolutely certain and
uniform.
5. It does away with the necessity for the
use of alum with poor flour, and the tempta-
tion to use alum with every kind of flour.
6. It has the recommendation of absolute
and entire cleanliness, the human hand not
touching the dough nor the bread from the
beginning of the process to the end. Even
in weighing the dough, if a piece must be
added to turn the scale, it' is added by the
use of a knife and fork.
7. The journeymen are relieved from a
circumstance most destructive to their health,
that of inhaling the flour dust in the process
of kneading. Their places of work, always
above ground, can easily be well ventilated ;
their hours of work need never be more than
the usual hours in ordinary occupations, with
the recognised hours for meals ; where a busi-
ness may be so large as to necessitate night
work, there may be separate sets of hands
for day and for night work, and each set of
hands may be able to change from night to
70 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
day-work in alternate weeks, as is done in
some other trades and occupations.
8. Its tendency is to produce a healthier
condition of the baking trade, and thereby
to diminish to a great extent the induce-
ments which lead to the extensive system
of fraud now practised upon the public by
the production of adulterated and inferior
bread.
9. It effects an immense saving in the
material from another source, namely, by
preventing the sacrifice of the nutritive por-
tion of the grain, hitherto lost as human
food, by the method of grinding and dressing
necessary in the preparation of flour for
making white bread by fermentation.
10. Together with the preservation of a
large proportion of the entire quantity of
wheat converted into flour, there is also the
important result of the proportion preserved
(the cerealine), being a most powerful agent
in promoting the easy and healthy digestion
of food. This agent is retained uninjured
by the aerated bread process, but is destroyed
by the process of panary fermentation.
Respecting these different advantages, we
may accept the statement of them as remain-
ECONOMIC A ND SA NIT A RY ADVA NTA GES. 7 1
ing as truthful as they were at the date when
they were originally described.
The economical advantages of the aerated
system put forth by the inventor of the
system, are certainly still deserving of a
prominent place. At a time such as the
present, when we are depending upon other
countries for our supplies of grain to the
extent of nearly two-thirds of those supplies,
it is of the utmost importance to secure
for the nation a system of bread manufacture
that shall save to the nation all that can be
saved. It may be said with perfect truthful-
ness of the aerated system, that it saves all
that can be saved ; in other words, it sacrifices
nothing that is fit for consumption as food,
while it utilizes every wholesome and nutri-
tious part that can be obtained from the grain.
At the same time, in the bread made by
this system there is nothing retained that is
not useful, pleasant, and beneficial. All the
old objections which were originally made to
aerated bread, if there was ever ground for
them, certainly do not exist in the slight-
est degree now. The general expression of
opinion is that the bread is extremely plea-
sant to taste, and so much is it approved of
72 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
that large numbers of persons take it with
them out of town, because they prefer the
flavour of it to that possessed by any other
form of bread, and because it does not
produce acidity.
I may leave the above-named objection to
what is commonly called the " taste " of bread
consumers. A more important point is the
healthiness and cleanliness of the aerated pro-
cess. Here there can be no doubt that the
process offers immeasurable advantages, first
to the workmen who make the bread, and
next to the public for whom they make it.
ADVANTAGES TO THE WORKMEN.
Of all the evils that have arisen with the
practice of bread manufacture, one of the
greatest of them appears to be the long hours
of night and day work to which the men are
subjected. This fact has long been recog-
nized. A statute of Elizabeth expressly
states the hours to be from five a.m. to be-
tween seven and eight p.m. between March
and September, with two and a half hours
for meals, and from " spring of day " until
" the night of the same day " between Sep-
tember and March. Day-work only was
ECONOMIC A ND SA NIT A RY ADVA NT A GES. 73
then permitted, and the item for candles is
supposed to have been for those used for
examining the state of the bread in the ovens,
as we now use gas. Later on, however,
night-work was introduced, the introduction
being largely due to the origin of a class
of men called "factors." These were a sort
of middlemen between the millers and the
bakers. The bakers having no interest in
keeping down the price, the millers were
enabled to realize large profits, and the coun-
try millers, by allowing these factors a pre-
mium on the sale of their flour, disposed of
considerable quantities. The country millers
also became proprietors of bakers' shops, in
which they put a journeyman, and allowed
him from five to seven shillings a sack for his
labour and charge. These men were in the
habit of availing themselves of the assistance
of their friends after working hours. This
system of helping their friends gradually
grew into a custom, and was at last enforced
as a right by those, in commission, when they
became proprietors of the shops they were
put in to superintend. Hence the origin of
night-work among bakers, an origin which
has now become part of a fixed system of
74 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
work, owing to the necessities of the time
and the urgent demand that there is in all
our large cities for the early morning loaf.
The grievances which have been enforced
by this practice have been and are extreme.
They have often formed matter for parlia-
mentary consideration. This was the case
in 1848, when various details of the most
painful kind were disclosed, and were con-
sidered as beyond dispute. This was again
the case in 1862, at which period Parliament
was so impressed, by what it was forced to
listen to, that the Secretary of State for
the Home Department thought it right to
order a searching and minute investigation
not only into the grievances complained of,
but also into the methods of bread-making,
the places in which it was made, and the
age and health of the men occupied in
making it, with a view to remedy and, if
possible, improve the existing conditions.
The inquiry thus instituted was entrusted
to Mr. Hugh Seymour Tremenhere, and
the result of Mr. Tremenhere's inquiries
on this subject was embodied in a letter
addressed to Sir George Grey, Her Majesty's
principal Secretary of State for the Home
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY ADVANTAGES. 75
t .
Department, in which the propositions recom-
mended for legislative consideration are the
following :
1. That no youth under eighteen be
allowed to work in a bakehouse later than
nine p.m., or earlier than five a.m.
2. That bakehouses be placed under in-
spection, and subjected to certain regulations
in regard to ventilation, cleanliness, etc. ;
and :
3. That it would be desirable that the pro-
visions of the Act " for Preventing the Adul-
teration of Articles of Food " should be made
more effectual.
These were the only measures Mr. Tre-
menhere felt justified in submitting to the
judgment of Parliament ; but there was an
important subject to which he considered it
desirable to direct the attention of the
journeymen bakers, their employers, and the
public at large, as not only involving great
prospective benefits to the journeymen, but
certain economical and other advantages to
the community, which would be considered of
no small value when the conditions of the
places in which the bread is not unfrequently
made were more generally known. This sub-
76 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
ject was the introduction of machinery in the
process of bread-making, in the discussion
of which Dr. Dauglish's system of making
what is called aerated bread was commented
upon and commended.
In the report here referred to it was shown'
that, as a general rule, the work of a London
journeyman baker begins at about eleven
o'clock at night, at which time " he makes the
dough." This is a laborious process, and lasts
from half an hour to three-quarters of an hour,
according to the size of the batch or the
labour required. He then lies down upon
the kneading board, which is also the cover-
ing of the trough in which the dough is
" made," and with one sack under him, and
another rolled up under his head for a pillow,
he sleeps for about two hours. He is then
engaged, continuously, for about five hours,
" throwing out the dough," " scaling it off,'*
moulding it, putting it into the oven, taking it
out of the oven and carrying it to the shop.
When the bread and roll making is ended,
the distribution of it begins, and a consider-
able proportion of the men thus employed
during the night are also upon their legs for
many hours in the day, carrying baskets or
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY ADVANTAGES. 77
wheeling hand carts, or being in the bake-
house at work again. Some of these men
leave off work at various hours, between one
and six p.m., according to the season of the
year or the amount of their master's business,
while others are engaged again in the bake-
house " bringing out " more batches, until
late in the afternoon.
The temperature of a bakehouse ranges
from about 75 to upwards of 90 Fahr.,
and in the smaller bakehouses approximates
usually to the higher rather than to the lower
degree of heat. It is self-evident that the
loss of the usual hours of sleep, and the hard
and continuous work for many hours in such
a temperature as that of bakehouses in general,
must have a great effect in undermining the
constitutions of the youths employed, and in
laying the foundation of that liability to
various diseases by which the average life of
a baker is reduced to the age of forty-two.
Mr. Tremenhere proposed that bakehouses
should be placed under inspection, and in
support of this proposition stated, from evi-
dence taken, the following facts : The
locality in which the bread of London is
made is what in houses in general is the coal-
78 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
hole and the front kitchen, the back kitchen
being used to store away the flour with the
other things in daily use. The ovens are
usually under the street, but in some cases
the arrangements are reversed and the ovens
are at the back of the house, and the front
space is used partly for the flour and partly
for the manual portions of the work. Mr.
John Bennett stated in his evidence that
" many bakehouses in London were in a
shockingly filthy state, arising from imperfect
sewerage and bad ventilation and neglect ;
that the bread, therefore, during the process of
fermentation, became impregnated with the
noxious gases surrounding it ; and that many
journeymen bakers in London slept under
the pavement in the bakehouses." Another
witness said, that "the places where he had
worked had almost always been arches under
the ground, with no means of ventilation
except through the doors. These were,
generally, fearfully hot, and many of them
infested with vermin. The bakehouses were
also often so close to the drains that they
smelt very bad. It was a common practice
to lock the bakehouses at night, while the
men were at work ; consequently, there being
ECONOMIC AND SANITARY AD VANTA GES. 79
no ventilation except through the doors, it
was very stifling, and apt to injure the men's
health."
Over twenty years have passed since
the above-named facts were written, and I
regret to say that no broad satisfactory im-
provement has been made for the health
of the men who are engaged in the manu-
facture of bread by the fermentation process.
While this treatise, indeed, has been in hand
there has been a great public clamour once
again on the subject of bakers and their
grievances, so that parliamentary enquiry
may very soon be expected once more to
take place.
Dauglish, by his labour, proposed a simple
method, which, if carried out universally,
as it might be most easily and practically, and
as it is by the company which he founded,
would render the process of bread manufac-
ture as healthy for the working community
as any other industrial pursuit, and indeed
healthier than any other which is carried on
during the night. Further, I do not conceal
my own personal opinion that if the system
were generally known and practised, the
necessity for night work itself would, as Dr.
80 THE AERATED SYSTEM.
Dauglish expected, cease to exist, since
nothing but the very bad habit of wishing
for newly-made fermented bread keeps up
the injurious competition for which night
work is demanded.
CHAPTER X.
PUBLIC ADVANTAGES OF AERATED BREAD, IN j
RELATION TO HEALTH.
|P to the present point of the inquiry
into the Dauglish process of bread
manufacture I have dealt almost
exclusively with the manufacturing
details of the process, and with the compari-
sons that are obvious as between it and the
method in which fermentation is resorted to
as a means for rendering wheaten dough light
and fitted for bread.
There have, at the same time, been
adduced, incidentally, certain facts which bear
upon the public advantages of the Dauglish
system.
I may now summarise these advantages :
i. The whole value of the edible part of
82 PUBLIC AD VANTA GES
the grain employed is utilized. There is no
waste whatever.
2. Every class of edible flour of wheaten
kind, which is that commonly used, can
be directly made into bread by the process.
3. No chemical agencies or agents are
brought into contact with the flour, except
the necessary carbonic acid, and that in a
purely mechanical way.
4. No foreign agents, such as salts of
copper, alum, or lime, are required for any
purpose. They, indeed, would only interrupt
and spoil the process.
5. The utmost cleanliness attends every
step of the proceeding. The flour is un-
touched by the hand; the dough is untouched
either by hand or foot ; the dough is never
exposed to the fumes of the bakehouse, nor
to the emanations escaping from the breath
and the skin of the workmen ; so soon as ever
the dough escapes from the mixer it falls into
the baking tin, and is instantly conveyed to
the oven.
6. The workmen are saved many hours of
exhaustive labour, and enjoy freedom from
the injuries arising from the inhalation of
dust and exposure to impure air. To what
OF AERATED BREAD. 83
extent they are saved danger in their work,
compared with those who are engaged in the
fermentation process, can only be believed
by persons who have made special inquiries
into the subject. Dr. Guy, in his admirable
and painstaking research on this subject,
discovered amongst one hundred and eleven
journeymen bakers one hundred and twenty-
five diseases, or more than one disease for
each man engaged in the fermenting process.
It is impossible to gainsay the many and
great advantages of the aerated system. But
is there anything that may be gainsaid ? If
there be, it must be something connected
with habit or custom, not with the aerated
bread itself as an article of food.
In the household nothing but good can be
told in regard to the appearance of the bread,
the cleanliness of it, the purity of it.
It is made in the same shapes as other
bread, in tinned loaves, in loaves of Paris
shape, in rolls, in loaves of different sizes. It
is made from flours of best qualities, from
white flour and from whole meal.
It is so cleanly that it is all but impossible,
even by accident, for any foreign substance
to get into it. Hairs, remnants of nails,
P US LIC ADVA NT A GES
debris from tubs, troughs, and boards, in
form of splinters of wood and fragments of
flannel or cloth, are impossible impurities in
it.
It does not undergo the sour or acid change
which is sometimes met with in fermented
breads. It never contains agents, like alum,
used for the purpose of giving it whiteness,
or for stopping secondary fermentation.
At one time it was said to become more
quickly dry than the fermented bread. This
was because it held less water in combination
with it, and was therefore a more condensed
food. Goodness or badness on this point
was matter of opinion, and as opinion seemed
to favour the possession of a bread which
retained its moisture, the public wish was
responded to by the modification of detail of
manufacture called the wine-whey process, of
which a description has already beep supplied,
The aerated bread now is as free from dry-
ness as any bread that is made. It does
not dry up, but retains the right quantity of
water, free from every acidified change, and
free from mouldiness or other indication of
decomposition, longer than other bread, so
that it can be used in the family up to the
OF AERA TED BREA D. 85
last if the most moderate care be taken in
preserving it.
It was at one time objected to the bread
that it was deficient in flavour, or that it
wanted the flavours common to some kinds
of fermented bread. For my own part, I
have no recollection of this ever having been
the case ; but if it were, the objection could
only have been reasonable at some very early
stage in the development of the aerated
method. At present, and for a long period
past, the flavour of the bread has been all
that could be desired by the most delicate
critic ; and, indeed, many choose the bread
because of its excellent flavour and taste, and
miss it very much if, from any cause, they are
temporarily unable to obtain it. This which
is very distinctly my own experience, is so
largely shared by others, that many, as
before stated, carry the bread out of town
rather than be deprived the advantages of
it as food.
It has yet to be asked whether, as an article
of food, aerated bread is as digestible and as
nutritive as the bread made by the fermenta-
tion process.
The first-named quality, that of digesti-
86 P UBLIC AD VANTA GES
bility, comes first in respect to value, because
if the bread be not easily digestible, its mere
value as a food, determined from the point of
view of its chemical value, were of secondary
consequence. It is most important therefore
to inquire into its true position as a digestible
food.
On this question I venture to speak with
such authority, and no more, as comes from
studied observation daily carried out for the
past ten years, at least. From this experience
I derive the following conclusions, which will,
I feel sure, be confirmed by every unpre-
judiced physician who will take the same
trouble and labour to arrive at the facts as
I have done.
i. The aerated bread never produces
acidity in the stomach. Even if it be taken
after it has been cut for some hours and
exposed to the air, it does not cause either
acid eructation, or the burning and the heart-
burn which are often induced by bread that
has been incompletely made by the fermenta-
tion process. The reason for this is that it
does not undergo any acidifying change by
exposure to air, does not carry free acid into
the stomach, and does not carry any sub-
OF A ERA TED BREA D.
stance into the stomach that can sustain fer-
mentative changes within that organ.
2. The bread, being free from any and
every astringent substance, like alum, does
not cause irritation of the stomach, nor dis-
tention, nor sense of constriction. It does
not constipate.
3. The bread carries with it no foreign
hard mechanical particles which are apt to
lead to mechanical irritation, and to make the
stomach indifferent to the digestion of other
foods or drinks which may be taken along
with it.
4. The bread is digested quickly and easily.
This is the common experience of all who
become accustomed to it. It causes no de-
pression after being taken, nor feeling of
weight, nor palpitation, nor irregular circula-
tion, symptoms which are often observed
after the use of imperfectly fermented breads.
5. The bread mixes excellently with other
foods. It is, if I may so say, essentially
soluble. It goes well with water, and well
with milk.
These indications of the action of aerated
bread are proofs of its worth as a digestible
food, and render it of much value in the cases
P UBLIC A D VA NTA GES
of children and of those who are advanced
in life. I do not adduce this in any dis-
paragement of it for adults and for persons
of middle life, because, in fact, it is good at
every age. I name it in particular reference
to the ages I have specially noticed.
Dauglish made a singularly happy series
of observations on the matter of the digesti-
bility of the bread manufactured on his plan
as compared with some effects of fermented
breads. He argued that the injurious effects
often resulting from the use of fermented
bread are attributable first to the acetic acid
or vinegar, which is produced in large quan-
tities in such bread, in hot weather, by the
oxidation, from atmospheric contact, of the
alcohol generated in the process of fermen-
tation ; and, secondly, to the yeast plant which
is rapidly propagated during the act of fer-
mentation, the life of the yeast plant being
frequently not destroyed by the baking
when that is ineffectively carried out. Bread
so modified from the required condition is,
he says, most indigestible when the functions
of digestion are naturally weak : from the
development of the yeast plant in the
stomach, and the consequent setting up of
OF AERATED BREAD. 89
the alcoholic fermentation to derange the
whole process of digestion and assimilation.
Again, he adds, there is the alum when
that is used, the very purpose of which is to
prevent the solution of gluten at a time when
it is most desirable, and the very effect of
which is to cause the bread to enter the
stomach with a portion of gluten undissolved,
and unfit to afford proper nourishment.
The inventor of the aerated system was
not less happy in his observations upon the
practice of those primitive nations who sub-
sist almost exclusively on cereal and particu-
larly on bread foods. " The millions," he says,
" of India who feed chiefly on rice, take rice,
for the most part, simply boiled, while that
large portion of the human race who feed on
maize prepare it in many ways, but never
ferment it." The same is true of the potato
eater of Ireland and the oatmeal eater of
Scotland. Nor is wheat always subjected to
fermentation. In the less civilized states it
is first roasted and then ground. On the
borders of the Mediterranean it is prepared
in the form of maccaroni and vermicelli. In
the East it is made into hard cakes, or into
thick and dense masses of baked flour and
90 PUBLIC AD VANTA GES
water. Even in our own nurseries wheaten
flour is baked before it is prepared, with milk,
for infants' food.
The necessity of subjecting wheaten grain
to these manipulations arises, Dauglish insists,
from its richness in gluten. If a little flour
be taken in the mouth, the starchy matter is
easily dissolved by the saliva and swallowed,
but the gluten remains, a thick, tenacious
pellet, which, if swallowed,- is extremely in-
digestible, because it cannot be penetrated
by the digestive solvents, which in that state
can only act on its small external surface ;
hence the necessity to prepare food from
wheat in such a manner as shall counteract
the tendency to cohere and form tenacious
masses. This is the object of baking the
flour, of making it into maccaroni, or of rais-
ing it into soft spongy bread. By all these
means an enormous surface is secured for the
action of the digestive juices, and this, he
believes, is the sole object to be sought
for in the preparation of bread from wheaten
flour.
I am myself of opinion that in the above
observations Dr. Dauglish has supplied
the most rational of all explanations bearing
OF AERATED BREAD. 91
on the advantages of treating flour in the
manufacture of bread. The secret of success
lies in the distribution of the gluten over an
enormous surface, so that it may be readily
acted upon by the digestive fluids. A great
number of physiological chemical changes
(probably fermentation itself) are due to
this matter of distribution of surface. The
aeration of the blood in the lungs is brought
about by such distribution. The changes
which take place in the minute blood-vessels
of the extreme parts of the body are pro-
duced in a similar manner.
The best bread, therefore, and the most
easily digested, is that in which there is the
completest distribution of gluten, combined
with the fullest amount of that substance, and
uncontaminated by the presence of any foreign
substance, either introduced or produced by
the method of manufacture.
In the aerated bread we have a food in
which these conditions are fulfilled in the
most complete manner. The starch of the
bread is well cooked, and is ready for assimi-
lation and for becoming the fuel of the animal
furnace. The gluten, prepared in the most
elaborate form for subjection to the digestive
92 PUBLIC A D VANTA GES
juices and for being made soluble by them, is
preserved in full quantity to fulfil its purposes
in the economy for the construction of the
vital tissues.
The aerated bread undergoes ready solu-
tion in the stomach. It does not produce
acidity ; it does not give rise to distension
nor flatulency ; it does not impair appetite by
causing indigestion.
The only serious objection I have ever heard
raised to the use of aerated bread is that it may
be too rich in nitrogenous food to suit those
who are constitutionally disposed to such affec-
tions as gout and chronic rheumatism. The
idea is entirely hypothetical, and is altogether
contradicted by the results of experience.
Persons who are of rheumatic and gouty dis-
position are often extremely disposed to
acidity, and require, more than others, foods
which are not liable to undergo fermentation
during the digestive process. To such per-
sons I find bread which has simply been
aerated the best of all cereal foods. It may
be given to them freely by merely withdraw-
ing a little animal food, if that be necessary,
and I have many times seen all the symptoms
of rheumatic and gouty indigestion disappear
OF AERATED BREAD.
93
by the one act of substituting aerated for
fermented bread.
To those who require a rich nitrogenous
diet; to children who are muscularly feeble;
to persons who are suffering from diseases
attended with much muscular prostration; to
those who being in health are exposed to
great physical labour; to those who are in
declining years, the aerated bread is the best,
I think, that can be supplied, apart altogether
from its perfect cleanliness in manufacture
and its economy in production.
APPENDIX.
APPENDIX.
A BRIEF PERSONAL OUTLINE OF THE LIFE OF
DR. DAUGLISH.
|T will interest many readers to have
at command the succeeding brief
outline of the life of the inventor
of the aerated system of bread
manufacture. The facts came into my
possession too late to be included in the
body of this work.
John Dauglish was born in the parish of
Bethnal Green, London, in the year 1824. He
was the son of William and Caroline Dauglish,
and on his mother's side was descended from
Sir Richard Baker, the well-known chronicler of
London. His father held a confidential position
in one of those large East Indian houses which
were swept away in the panic of 1847. The boy,
who manifested peculiarities at a very early age,
was educated at Dr. Alexander Allen's school at
APPENDIX.
Hackney, but could never learn in class. He
always had to study alone. Having no verbal
memory, he yet retained facts with great facility;
and while he could scarcely learn a piece of
poetry or remember the conjugations of a Latin
verb, he enjoyed mathematical studies and de-
lighted in drawing. He had no gift for languages ;
it was an impossibility to master them, and even
in later life he could not overcome that difficulty ;
but he evinced mechanical talents at a very early
age, and constructed a steam engine, making all
the parts which most lads would have found it
necessary to buy, and with few tools and appli-
ances. He also while a boy invented a paddle-
wheel on new principles ; but when his model
was completed, he, to his intense mortification,
found that another mind had conceived the same
idea and had carried it into effect. His regret
was counterbalanced in some degree by the per-
fect working of the paddles, which were in every
respect like his own.
After leaving school, two or three different
paths in life opened out to him, but he was not
happy in any; and although he worked for a time
under his father, he was so evidently in his wrong
place, that his spirits were depressed and his
health seriously affected. During this period his
mind passed through successive stages of inquiry
and speculation. The philosophy of the German
school and of Carlyle were studied. He lived very
much apart, sought few acquaintances, and during
his most uncongenial occupation, spent a dreary
LIFE OF DAUGLISH. 99
and saddened life. As he advanced in years his
views were much influenced by the teaching of
Maurice and Kingsley.
In 1848 Dr. Dauglish married the second
daughter of William Consett Wright, of Upper
Clapton. About this time he was much engaged
in literary pursuits. ,He contributed an article
to the British Quarterly on the Labour Question,
which was well thought of.
It was now suggested, by one who knew the
bent of his mind, that he should go to Edinburgh
to study for the medical profession. He took his
family there in February 1852, and for nearly
four years he devoted his energies to the necessary
studies. Here the early difficulties of his boyish
days were a source of great trouble. He had
much difficulty in mastering technicalities. He
was a good dissector, and obtained great praise
from Professor Goodsir, who always discerned true
industry and skill. He became assistant to
Professor Hughes Bennett, took the charge of an
extra microscopic class, and was also employed by
Professor Henderson. For all these gentlemen he
felt very deep esteem and gratitude. In chemistry
he studied under Professor Gregory, whose kindly
manners and friendliness caused his classes to be
very popular.
During his residence in Edinburgh, Dauglish
made but few acquaintances. His fellow students
thought him reserved and quiet, and, in student
fashion, bestowed upon him the cognomen of
" Shakespeare " ; from a fancied resemblance to
ioo APPENDIX.
the great dramatist. He passed his examinations
well, but there was nothing particularly brilliant
in this part of his career. His thesis was
considered worthy of being bracketed with one
other for the gold medal. He took the M.D.
degree.
In November 1855 he came home from
college, with a new idea about making bread,
namely, that it would be possible to enclose flour
in an air-tight receptacle, and to force into it
aerated water, so as to render yeast unnecessary.
He had suffered so much from the dry insipid
bread of Edinburgh, that he had had bread made
at home ; and the uncertain nature of each batch,
with the difficulty of procuring good yeast, had
led him to make a series of experiments which
were the beginnings of his inventions.
At the conclusion of his medical studies he
went to Malvern to study hydropathy, and was
nearly a year there. During this period he was
steadily working out his inventions. Afterwards
moving to Brighton, he tried his first experi-
ments. He found a working mechanic, who made
a little model machine from his drawings. The
skill he possessed in mechanical drawing was
one of the chief factors in the success afterwards
obtained. No verbal explanation could have
conveyed the idea which the inventor was able
to demonstrate with perfect clearness on paper,
and he always supplied every working drawing
himself.
The model was complete; the various mixtures
LIFE OF DA UGLISH. 101
for the production of carbonic acid gas were intro-
duced into it, the flour and the water. The experi-
menter watched the result with the usual anxiety.
An explosion or success, which would it be ? His
theory proved to be right, and he was convinced
that with perseverance it could be developed.
In 1856 Dr. Dauglish took out his first patent,
entitling it " An Invention of an improved Method
of Making Bread " ; and he wrote to Messrs. Carr,
of Carlisle, to ask their co-operation. In their
factory the model machine was erected, and the
" aerated bread " first made. The experiments
were perfectly successful, and here the name of
" aerated bread " was first suggested. It now
remained to bring the invention before the public,
to make it a successful monetary speculation.
But many troubles arose. Different large houses
took up the invention ; but from its novelty, from
the elementary construction of the machinery,
and from the difficulty of inducing workmen to
lay aside preconceived ideas of baking after fer-
menting, there were continual failures. The prin-
cipals were disgusted, and there was so much
worry and trouble that the inventor gave up the
struggle in despair, and taking up medical practice,
which he had laid for the time entirely aside, met
with sufficient success to warrant the belief that
he would become a successful physician. In spite
of this, his project could not be relinquished, and
again he determined to devote all his attention
to it, and to try once more whether it could not
be made successful.
APPENDIX.
The earnestness he displayed in his renewed
efforts led different friends to rally round him, and
at last a model bakery was erected at Islington.
Dr. Dauglish superintended every detail, and
the attempt proved to be a great success. Most
of the leading physicians of the day gave their
decided and unequivocal approval. The aerated
bread was introduced into various hospitals, and
with scarcely a dissentient voice the invention was
declared to be one of the most important and
useful of the day.
For a lecture delivered by Dr. Dauglish before
the Society of Arts, he gained the silver medal of
that Society. To the Press he was under great
obligations. Nearly every paper and magazine
followed the example of the Times in giving
publicity to a scheme so novel and practical.
Unhappily Dr. Dauglish quickly began to feel
how seriously these labours and anxieties had
affected his health. Although his object was in part
effected, he. could not rest. He was advised to go
abroad, and after many delays he took his wife
and children to Veytaux, on the Lake of Geneva.
He spent the winter of 1864 on this spot. At
first the' change of scene, the extreme dryness of
the atmosphere, and the elasticity of the air,
seemed to do him real good. His mind, however,
could not be diverted. He was always planning
new improvements, and was distressed by the
accounts of failures and losses which came from
England ; he got nervous and feeble, and began
to feel that he could only walk on level ground.
LIFE OF DAUGLISH. 103
In the spring he was hastily summoned home
by important business, and left Switzerland with a
feeling of disappointment and distress. The winter
of i 864 was a season of deep anxiety. He re-
mained in London long enough to set matters
straight, but never himself recovered from the
effects of all this trouble. He sought health in
different places, and in August 1865 went to Paris,
intending to go southward, but the anxieties of
the past winter had proved too much for him
to bear. He became seriously ill in Paris, and
although the opinion of the physicians there was
not such as to cause great alarm, he desired most
anxiously to return to England, a desire which
was accomplished with difficulty. On his return
to London he consulted one of our most eminent
men, who gave the first unfavourable opinion, and
then went to Malvern, where, often before, he
had gained strength and health. Here, while his
serious illness much increased, he manifested the
utmost patience, his mind remaining clear, active,
and collected to the end.
Dr. Dauglish was in the midst of his family to
the very last evening of his life, taking interest
in their concerns, and going to bed more com-
fortably and hopefully than he had done for many
nights past. He sank from effusion of water in
the pericardium, and died painlessly on Sunday,
1 4th January, 1866, in the forty-second year of
his age. B. W. R.
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