The Science of Stale Bread
And the secret to reversing it
The disappointment of devouring a fresh baguette for dinner, dreaming about it all night, only to wake up the next day to a stale, rigid loaf is all too familiar. As a bread lover and general lover of all carbohydrates, I feel your pain.
While most of us easily recognize the signs of staling, like a crumbly texture and leathery crust, I’m guessing many don’t have any idea what’s happening inside the bread to create these changes. But, if we can uncover the cause of staling, it’ll be much easier to understand how to reverse it.
And it’s not a simple issue of water loss. It’s really a starch problem.
Starch Chemistry 101
Many of us understand that bread contains something called starch, but we might not be exactly sure what it is or how it functions in baked goods. Well, here’s a little bit of background so we can get to the bottom of this staling issue.
Plants store energy in the form of starch molecules. Starch is produced by connecting hundreds of glucose (sugar) units together to form a larger compound. Most often, starch is concentrated into a granule. Most cereals like wheat, corn, and rice are excellent sources of starch.
