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I always look at the ingredients list of bread in the US and I am always surprised how long the list is. Why do they put so much stuff (and always sugar or syru

I always look at the ingredients list of bread in the US and I am always surprised how long the list is. Why do they put so much stuff (and always sugar or syrup) into any bread?

shermozle 7y ago
Modern bread (including in those other countries without the additives mentioned in this article) isn't generally yeast risen. Yeast is added for flavour only. Expensive breads are different but the regular stuff you buy in supermarkets is agitated with hardened fats to trap air. Yeast not involved. This changes many of the properties of the bread and the long-term effects of this change aren't well understood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorleywood_bread_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorleywood_bread_process No knead bread is really easy to make, low effort, ridiculously cheap and able to fit into a busy lifestyle. It uses long fermentation with yeast to rise and condition the dough. I use this recipe: https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/03/basic-no-knead-bread-dough-jim-lahey-recipe.html https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/03/basic-no-knead-b...
- chrisseaton 7y ago
  Is it just me or does that Wikipedia article never really explain how the process works? It says three times that it 'allows the use of lower-protein wheats', but I can't see where it says how. (Your comment does explain it.)
cknoxrun 7y ago
I was surprised to see how much sugar is in bread in the US compared to the bread I buy in Canada (specifically grocery store "bagged bread"). The sweetness makes it taste awful, and hides the taste of the wheat and different grains.
- goostavos 7y ago
  It's also crazy hard to find bread _without_ sugar. I get that some will be in there for color / browning during cooking, but the amounts that are present in the average loaf are insane. I've had loafs that were like 5% sugar by weight (as measured from my kitchen scale + food label).
  - deleted 7y ago
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deleted 7y ago
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Artemix 7y ago
Sugar is a drug, so I guess that addiction can play here. There's not a lot of regulations for health and safety around most ingredients, so I'd say that also plays: Fewer risks of decay and such
- 1338 7y ago
  sugar is not a drug. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug
  - wizlord 7y ago
    Not a drug cuz wikpedia told meh. Got it.
pkaye 7y ago
Most of the ingredients are for longer shelf life since they are shipped from large factories. You can get bread with fewer ingredients which tend to be from local smaller scale operations. As for sugar it might just be taste preferences in the US. I'm sure the manufacturers do market testing.
- maxxxxx 7y ago
  It seems a lot of US good is designed for easy handling and addictiveness. There is no concern for purity.
logfromblammo 7y ago
Some of it, because they are required to, by law. Some of it, because they are allowed to, by law. Usually, whenever you see sugar added where it is not necessary, it's because fat or salt was removed from the recipe, to "improve" the numbers on the nutrition panel. And then you have to add the fat and salt back in yourself later, with butter or mayo or something. You can't reliably and conveniently get "good" bread in the US unless you own a bread machine, and even then you have to pick out your flour carefully. I knew someone that had a grain mill attachment for their electric mixer, so they could make their own whole-grain flours, and be able to trust that they were what they appeared to be. Eventually, that became too inconvenient, and they just stopped eating bread altogether.
- NullPrefix 7y ago
  >. And then you have to add the ... and salt back in yourself later, with butter or mayo or something. Sounds like you're addicted to salt. Have you tried food without salt? After couple of weeks your taste buds adapt and you can actually taste the food.
- justin66 7y ago
  > You can't reliably and conveniently get "good" bread in the US unless you own a bread machine, and even then you have to pick out your flour carefully. Or live near a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods. They're not that unusual.
  - thatfrenchguy 7y ago
    It's not "good" bread though.
    - logfromblammo 7y ago
      At some point "good" bread goes to "no true Scotsman" bread. The point is that for loaf bread, a staple food for much of civilization, you have to go out of your way and make a special effort in the US to find something of similar quality to that which is the default at food merchants in other parts of the world. As I don't have a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods anywhere near me, I can't speak to the quality of their bread offerings. At Kroger or Publix or Piggly Wiggly or Target or Wal-mart, the bagged & sliced bread quality is so far below the basic-recipe bread machine loaf that the only reasonable use case for it is to make sandwiches, where the purpose of the bread is to have a neutral flavor, and keep the other ingredients together and off your hands--a task which might still be better suited to a tortilla or cabbage leaves. Ezekiel bread suffers from the "lifestyle aisle" problem at most grocery stores. To the store management, it isn't a "bread" as much as it is "alt-healthy lifestyle food". You don't even know it's there, unless you happen to notice it in the fridges next to the kombucha, kefir, cage-free barn-free pastured free-range eggs, and organic juice brands. If you were shopping for "bread", you would probably miss it, because it's nowhere near the bakery or the other breads. So "normal" people don't buy it, and then the store drops it from lack of sales.
rasz 7y ago
Screw bread, they put sugar into mouthwash...
- Sohcahtoa82 7y ago
  Go any evidence of that? A quick Google search doesn't show me any results indicating mouthwash containing sugar.
  - rasz 7y ago
    look at the label?
    - Sohcahtoa82 7y ago
      I have. It does not contain sugar or any sugar-like ingredients.
      - rasz 7y ago
        Rechecked some of the more ridiculous mouthwash (sweet ice tea, lemon flavored) and you are right about sugar, its "only" artificial sweetener - saccharin.
  - ineedasername 7y ago
    What terms did your google search use? A quick google for "listerine ingredients" brought up a label [0] that shows caramel (sugar) as an inactive ingredient. Only one I could find though. Most others however do seem to use artificial sweeteners [0] https://www.drugs.com/otc/113880/listerine-01.jpg https://www.drugs.com/otc/113880/listerine-01.jpg
    - unclenoriega 7y ago
      "Caramel" in this case likely refers to caramel color. While it is still made from sugar, I doubt there's a significant enough amount to consider it "added sugar". If you look at the other colors of Listerine, there is no caramel listed.
zrobotics 7y ago
While I would agree that store-bought bread in the US contains far, far too much sugar (which is why I started baking bread myself in the first place), some amount of sugar is almost always required for leavened bread. The added sugar is what the yeast feeds on initially, since most flour won't provide enough easily-digestible sugars for the yeast. However, the amount of sugar required isn't much; my go-to recipie calls for 1 tablespoon of molasses for a 1.5lb loaf of rye/buckwheat loaf. As to the length, for example the ingredient list of wonderbread from [0]: unbleached enriched flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, high fructose corn syrup, yeast, contains 2% or less of each of the following: calcium carbonate, soybean oil, wheat gluten, salt, dough conditioners (contains one or more of the following: sodium stearoyl lactylate, calcium stearoyl lactylate, monoglycerides, mono- and diglycerides, azodicarbonamide, enzymes, ascorbic acid), vinegar, monocalcium phosphate, yeast extract, modified corn starch, sucrose, sugar, soy lecithin, cholecalciferol (vitamin d3), soy flour, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, calcium propionate (to retard spoilage). In order, the oil is for crumb texture and added fat, the salt is to regulate yeast growth, the gluten is to allow the crumb to hold together better (especially as most of the naturally-occuring gluten is removed from white flour). The dough conditioners are used to get the horrible texture that people expect from wonder-bread, as well as making it easy (read: extremely consistent) to bake at massive scale. The rest are preservatives & nutrient enricheners. The preservatives allow the bread to last long enough to make it to a supermarket; fresh-baked bread spoils extremely quickly. As far as what is actually needed to make the white bread, for the white bread I bake on occasion all that is used is flour, sugar, gluten, oil, yeast and salt in order of volume. Note however that this bread will only last a few days; and ideally will be consumed the same day as baking. [0] https://www.fooducate.com/product/Wonder%20Classic%20White%20Bread/556190A2-32C7-11E3-A74D-1E047F0525AB https://www.fooducate.com/product/Wonder%20Classic%20White%2...
- dbt00 7y ago
  > niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid And these are just iron and b-complex vitamins, the "enriched" part of enriched flour.
- icebraining 7y ago

I always look at the ingredients list of bread in the US and I am always surprised how long the list is. Why do they put so much stuff (and always sugar or syrup) into any bread?

shermozle 7y ago

Modern bread (including in those other countries without the additives mentioned in this article) isn't generally yeast risen. Yeast is added for flavour only. Expensive breads are different but the regular stuff you buy in supermarkets is agitated with hardened fats to trap air. Yeast not involved. This changes many of the properties of the bread and the long-term effects of this change aren't well understood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorleywood_bread_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorleywood_bread_process No knead bread is really easy to make, low effort, ridiculously cheap and able to fit into a busy lifestyle. It uses long fermentation with yeast to rise and condition the dough. I use this recipe: https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/03/basic-no-knead-bread-dough-jim-lahey-recipe.html https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/03/basic-no-knead-b...

chrisseaton 7y ago
Is it just me or does that Wikipedia article never really explain how the process works? It says three times that it 'allows the use of lower-protein wheats', but I can't see where it says how. (Your comment does explain it.)

cknoxrun 7y ago

I was surprised to see how much sugar is in bread in the US compared to the bread I buy in Canada (specifically grocery store "bagged bread"). The sweetness makes it taste awful, and hides the taste of the wheat and different grains.

goostavos 7y ago
It's also crazy hard to find bread _without_ sugar. I get that some will be in there for color / browning during cooking, but the amounts that are present in the average loaf are insane. I've had loafs that were like 5% sugar by weight (as measured from my kitchen scale + food label).
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Artemix 7y ago

Sugar is a drug, so I guess that addiction can play here. There's not a lot of regulations for health and safety around most ingredients, so I'd say that also plays: Fewer risks of decay and such

1338 7y ago
sugar is not a drug. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug
- wizlord 7y ago
  Not a drug cuz wikpedia told meh. Got it.

pkaye 7y ago

Most of the ingredients are for longer shelf life since they are shipped from large factories. You can get bread with fewer ingredients which tend to be from local smaller scale operations. As for sugar it might just be taste preferences in the US. I'm sure the manufacturers do market testing.

maxxxxx 7y ago
It seems a lot of US good is designed for easy handling and addictiveness. There is no concern for purity.

logfromblammo 7y ago

Some of it, because they are required to, by law. Some of it, because they are allowed to, by law. Usually, whenever you see sugar added where it is not necessary, it's because fat or salt was removed from the recipe, to "improve" the numbers on the nutrition panel. And then you have to add the fat and salt back in yourself later, with butter or mayo or something. You can't reliably and conveniently get "good" bread in the US unless you own a bread machine, and even then you have to pick out your flour carefully. I knew someone that had a grain mill attachment for their electric mixer, so they could make their own whole-grain flours, and be able to trust that they were what they appeared to be. Eventually, that became too inconvenient, and they just stopped eating bread altogether.

NullPrefix 7y ago
>. And then you have to add the ... and salt back in yourself later, with butter or mayo or something. Sounds like you're addicted to salt. Have you tried food without salt? After couple of weeks your taste buds adapt and you can actually taste the food.
justin66 7y ago
> You can't reliably and conveniently get "good" bread in the US unless you own a bread machine, and even then you have to pick out your flour carefully. Or live near a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods. They're not that unusual.
- thatfrenchguy 7y ago
  It's not "good" bread though.
  - logfromblammo 7y ago
    At some point "good" bread goes to "no true Scotsman" bread. The point is that for loaf bread, a staple food for much of civilization, you have to go out of your way and make a special effort in the US to find something of similar quality to that which is the default at food merchants in other parts of the world. As I don't have a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods anywhere near me, I can't speak to the quality of their bread offerings. At Kroger or Publix or Piggly Wiggly or Target or Wal-mart, the bagged & sliced bread quality is so far below the basic-recipe bread machine loaf that the only reasonable use case for it is to make sandwiches, where the purpose of the bread is to have a neutral flavor, and keep the other ingredients together and off your hands--a task which might still be better suited to a tortilla or cabbage leaves. Ezekiel bread suffers from the "lifestyle aisle" problem at most grocery stores. To the store management, it isn't a "bread" as much as it is "alt-healthy lifestyle food". You don't even know it's there, unless you happen to notice it in the fridges next to the kombucha, kefir, cage-free barn-free pastured free-range eggs, and organic juice brands. If you were shopping for "bread", you would probably miss it, because it's nowhere near the bakery or the other breads. So "normal" people don't buy it, and then the store drops it from lack of sales.

rasz 7y ago

Screw bread, they put sugar into mouthwash...

Sohcahtoa82 7y ago
Go any evidence of that? A quick Google search doesn't show me any results indicating mouthwash containing sugar.
- rasz 7y ago
  look at the label?
  - Sohcahtoa82 7y ago
    I have. It does not contain sugar or any sugar-like ingredients.
    - rasz 7y ago
      Rechecked some of the more ridiculous mouthwash (sweet ice tea, lemon flavored) and you are right about sugar, its "only" artificial sweetener - saccharin.
- ineedasername 7y ago
  What terms did your google search use? A quick google for "listerine ingredients" brought up a label [0] that shows caramel (sugar) as an inactive ingredient. Only one I could find though. Most others however do seem to use artificial sweeteners [0] https://www.drugs.com/otc/113880/listerine-01.jpg https://www.drugs.com/otc/113880/listerine-01.jpg
  - unclenoriega 7y ago
    "Caramel" in this case likely refers to caramel color. While it is still made from sugar, I doubt there's a significant enough amount to consider it "added sugar". If you look at the other colors of Listerine, there is no caramel listed.

zrobotics 7y ago

While I would agree that store-bought bread in the US contains far, far too much sugar (which is why I started baking bread myself in the first place), some amount of sugar is almost always required for leavened bread. The added sugar is what the yeast feeds on initially, since most flour won't provide enough easily-digestible sugars for the yeast. However, the amount of sugar required isn't much; my go-to recipie calls for 1 tablespoon of molasses for a 1.5lb loaf of rye/buckwheat loaf. As to the length, for example the ingredient list of wonderbread from [0]: unbleached enriched flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, high fructose corn syrup, yeast, contains 2% or less of each of the following: calcium carbonate, soybean oil, wheat gluten, salt, dough conditioners (contains one or more of the following: sodium stearoyl lactylate, calcium stearoyl lactylate, monoglycerides, mono- and diglycerides, azodicarbonamide, enzymes, ascorbic acid), vinegar, monocalcium phosphate, yeast extract, modified corn starch, sucrose, sugar, soy lecithin, cholecalciferol (vitamin d3), soy flour, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, calcium propionate (to retard spoilage). In order, the oil is for crumb texture and added fat, the salt is to regulate yeast growth, the gluten is to allow the crumb to hold together better (especially as most of the naturally-occuring gluten is removed from white flour). The dough conditioners are used to get the horrible texture that people expect from wonder-bread, as well as making it easy (read: extremely consistent) to bake at massive scale. The rest are preservatives & nutrient enricheners. The preservatives allow the bread to last long enough to make it to a supermarket; fresh-baked bread spoils extremely quickly. As far as what is actually needed to make the white bread, for the white bread I bake on occasion all that is used is flour, sugar, gluten, oil, yeast and salt in order of volume. Note however that this bread will only last a few days; and ideally will be consumed the same day as baking. [0] https://www.fooducate.com/product/Wonder%20Classic%20White%20Bread/556190A2-32C7-11E3-A74D-1E047F0525AB https://www.fooducate.com/product/Wonder%20Classic%20White%2...

dbt00 7y ago
> niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid And these are just iron and b-complex vitamins, the "enriched" part of enriched flour.
icebraining 7y ago