Mountain people love fried foods, and the women worked hard to create different combinations of food to serve, because the basic diet of bread, potatoes milk, eggs, vegetables, and so on, was so boring otherwise. They must have rejoiced when they learned how to make fritter batter, because it gave them a variety of ways to serve fruits and vegetables. When Ritter’s Lumber Mill was built at Stoney Fork after World War II, Father worked for a time cutting timber. When he worked he always bought lightbread and meat for Mother to fix sandwiches for his lunch. We used to cry and beg Mother to give us slices of lightbread. It seemed so much better to our taste than biscuits and cornbread.
Some women in the community made yeast breads and rolls. We never did. Poverty can grind a person down until there is nothing left but to endure. This happened to my Mother. She bore ten children and spent endless hours washing, cooking, and trying to keep us clean. She had no time or energy to experiment and try out new recipes. Later in my life I learned to make yeast bread and rolls, but they never tasted as good to me as the lightbread Father took for his lunch.
—Sidney Saylor Farr “More Than Moonshine”
Hard for me to imagine light bread tasting better than biscuits or cornbread, but I know we often want what we can’t have. And as Sidney said, their diets consisted of eating the same things over and over. Today if get a hankering for a more exotic meal there’s usually a restaurant serving it within driving distance or a grocery store shelf with all the needed ingredients to make the meal at home.
Even though I’m crazy about biscuits and cornbread, if I’m having a sandwich I love to use store bought light bread.
Last night’s video: A Murder of Crows! & Tomatoes and Peppers Are Finally in the Ground!
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my introduction to the foods of the South , in particular Western North Carolina was through school lunch. my family was from New York and there were no Yankees and my school much less my part of the county. on my lunch tray I don’t recall the meat, but I do recall there was cornbread and some kids were putting it in their buttermilk. don’t like buttermilk never have but I do you enjoy cornbread 45 years later. thankfully my parents bought a bunch of John Parris’ books…and I got a lot of insight through him, as well as my friend’s mom. and regarding store-bought bread it is good awful these days. In fact, I thought some bread my husband bought recently was a diet bread because it was so thin and full of air but nope it was just the food Lion Brand. the only thing positive has been I haven’t been eating this much of it
When the government decided that citizens could not read labels and banned trans-fats for our own good; there went the flavor & consistency of a million familiar and beloved foods. Everything from Wonder Bread (Every store-bought sliced loaf, really), to Saltine crackers, to Entenmann’s Donuts, to McDonald’s french fries lost the flavors we all knew and love, and in some cases, their textures. I recall several phone calls to Kellogg’s because a brand of cracker I regularly enjoyed with preserves, wouldn’t make it out of the box, much less survive under the light pressure of the spreading knife without shattering to pieces. Kellogg’s apologized profusely and explained that due to the new requirements, they had to try to find another ingredient that would combine and keep the shape and flavor of the crackers. I noticed almost a soapy, almost slimy, strangely tough texture to some breads, and a lot less flavor to affected foods, overall.
It started off in few cities but went countrywide. I recall trying to organize a “grocery holiday” to visit friends in Milwaukee, who didn’t yet have the restriction {and were disgusted visiting me and eating some of the altered foods, “Doing that to a McDonald’s Apple Pie is a crime against humanity!”}, to pick up everything that used to taste good. They might not have lasted long back home, but I’d have delicious normalcy for one more day.
I’ve been told that my great-grandfather wouldn’t eat light bread, because it wasn’t as filling as cornbread or homemade biscuits. He said that he “might as well lie down and let the sun shine in his mouth” as to eat light bread.
Growing up, we never had light bread. it was always biscuits or Cornbread. We couldn’t afford
light bread. It’s great for a sandwich but I would still drather gave biscuits or Cornbread any day.
At our table was biscuits for breakfast and cornbread for supper. A baloney sandwich on Merita bread and a Pepsi Cola was a special treat.
Sometimes today I still eat a baloney sandwich with a big slice of a fresh tomato and fresh light bread that sticks to the roof your mouth. It’s so good!!!
In Raleigh the production bakery was Continental Bakery on Hillsborough Street not too far from Meredith College. Driving by it when the ovens were at work would make you hungry. I don’t know – or have forgot if I ever did know – what brands were put on their bread packaging.
Does anyone remember Merita bread? That was the brand I was told to buy when sent to the store for loaf bread. We called it loaf bread when buying it but light bread when we ate it. Same bread. Go figure.
Blessings to all . . .
Merita bread sponsored The Lone Ranger and Tonto on the radio Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We heard Cisco and Pancho on Tuesday and Thursday, but I don’t remember the sponsored that show. You could send in something from the wrapper and get silver bullets, etc.
I miss Merita Bread! I wish I could find something comparable.
Merita. Daddy wanted to name me “Merita” but mama over ruled. Darn it !!!
I had never heard the phrase “light bread” until I started reading Blind Pig and the Acorn posts. If I’m understanding correctly, it’s white bread. I grew up on Wonder Bread. It used to be the only loaf bread I liked to eat. Unfortunately the company started adding soybean oil to their bread, like so many other products do now. I don’t buy store bought bread anymore due to the ingredients. Instead I make a couple of sourdough boules every other week, but I do miss the Wonder Bread loaves from my childhood. Tipper, I think of you and your family often. I’m praying for you all.
Light bread, loaf bread, white bread. It it’s fresh, nothing any better especially when making a sandwich. I remember when I was a child, getting a slice, taking the inside and rolling it up into a ball and eating it plain or rolling it in sugar. So good!!!
I live near Valdese where the Waldensian Bakery used to be. The bakery is still there and still operating but the Waldensians sold it out. That bakery used to bake most of the Sunbeam bread for Western North Carolina. They baked other breads too but Sunbeam was their centerpoint. They even had a huge billboard like sign on top of the building with only the smiling face of Little Miss Sunbeam on it.
The smell of that place was mouthwatering when they were baking the bread. It permeated the whole town with the aroma of thousands of loaves of bread still in the ovens. Depending on the wind direction people far away could smell the smell of fresh bread baking.
That was a long time ago. You can still smell the bread when it bakes but the taste is gone. I can no longer smell or taste the yeastiness. It tastes and smells like nothing. “You’ve lost you sense of taste as you got older!” If that were so then why do biscuits and cornbread taste better.
I don’t eat sandwiches any more. I can bake pretty good yeast bread to make sandwiches if I wanted to but it gets stale too fast. I don’t have all the right chemicals to make it stay “fresh” for two weeks on the counter.
I do make a mean pizza crust if that counts. Nope not a boxed mix just flour, yeast, salt and olive oil.
Hi Ed,
Your comment on the bread going stale fast because of no chemicals was good for a big chuckle! We sometimes had pineapple sandwiches from the can and of course there is no substitute for light bread if you are fixing a tomato or banana sandwich. There is something changed in the bread now…I don’t know what, but it’s different.
I grew up calling bread from a store “light bread” also. As a child, I didn’t know there was any other kind of bread except white bread. Homemade bread was also white. A common lunch was a baloney sandwich on white bread.
I had never encountered cornbread that had sugar in it until we moved farther north. We called the sweetened corn bread “Yankee cornbread.” I never acquired a taste for sugar in my cornbread. My mother fried her cornbread in a cast iron skillet seasoned with bacon grease or oven baked it in the same skillet. I liked the fried cornbread better than the baked. Nothing better than beans and cornbread with a few green onions on the side!
I don’t buy light bread anymore…the more grains there are in my store bought bread the better I like it. I made bread for a time when I had a bread maker, but I donated it awhile back. Too much trouble for a person living alone.
Enjoyed reading about those memories from Sidney Saylor Farr. Brought back memories of when my Grandaddy (my moms dad) worked at the local sawmill here when I was a young boy and my granny would pack his lunch box with sandwiches made with light bread and us grandkids would always run out to meet him at his truck when he came home from work to see if he had any left over sandwiches in his lunch box for us to eat, and if he did those were some of the best sandwiches we ever ate. Especially a peanut butter & jelly, because after being in his lunch box all day the jelly would be soaked through to the out side of the light bread and oh boy was that good.
We love our light bread around here to.
Good memories from Sidney Saylor Farr. Bread of any kind is a big part of meals throughout our lives.
My parent didn’t buy light bread until I was almost grown. I remember some brands from back in the day that I haven’t seen in years. Some of the brands were Kerns, Sunshine, and Betsy Ross. The school lunchroom lady had a daughter my age that invited me to spend the night. They made yeast rolls for dinner, a kind of bread I had never had before. The memory of eating those delicious rolls remains with me all these years later.
I remember my daddy (born 1918) telling a story about a teacher who brought a sandwich made with light bread everyday for her lunch. He pictured that as a luxury. One day he mentioned her sandwich to her. She immediately suggested that they exchange sandwiches. She knew that biscuit and country ham would taste much better!
I can taste perfume in most bread. That’s what Roundup tastes like btw. It’s in every cracker and bread. I’d rather have plain and pure than rich and poisonous. Stay away from APEEL on fruit. I’m even finding SHELAC on apples. Totally legal and good for you! Put that in the old pipe and smoke on it awhile and you’ll KNOW I speak only truth… can’t we just live? I’m asking for a dear dear friend.
I wash most of the fruits and vegetables I buy with dishsoap and water. People say “No! You can do that. That stuff ain’t good for you!” I say, “You wash your pots and pans, plates and silverware with it. Is a little more going to hurt you?”
I’ll take your word on all of the above. If you read the ingredients on lightbread, you might find cellulose. Nothing but wood fibers. Diet loaves are almost sure to have it. Wonder what they used for filler with before strict labeling laws?
I’ve heard of sawdust being used as a filler in bread.
The hush of most grains is made of cellulose. So they take it out, then put it back and say they have added something? Makes sense to me!
Husk!
Growing up, mother would have store-bought bread for meals and I felt like something was missing. Grandma & Aunt Polly would have home-baked ‘brown’ bread which I preferred.
As an adult, due to time restraints that comes with working outside the home, I would pick up store- bought bread for toast and sandwiches for the family.
All these years later, I still love the aroma of fresh baked bread. It takes me back to a happier, simpler time & place.
My mother (born 1918) often told how she and her siblings would not eat lunch at the highschool with the others as they had biscuits and the city kids had light bread.
They felt embarrassed at there sandwich in front of others.
Hi Tipper, I grew up on ‘white’ bread and love it, but all the craze around here is for whole wheat, brown, rye or sourdough bread. I got my cookbook yesterday on Mother’s Day, what a nice gift to myself. I’m so excited to read the stories and try the recipes. Thank you and Jim for all the hard work that went into getting the book ready for publishing!
Our church has been praying for Miss Cindy and your family. I find comfort in Isaiah 43:1-3, He’s always with us during good and bad times. Thoughts are on you and your family!
Both my Grandmothers made bread, ours was tin loafs from the bakery. Sometime delivered by the mail-run. Mum noticed we were cutting bigger and bigger slices, so Mum brought ready sliced bread (3-4 slices to make the thickness of one cut). A story. A great uncle was a baker. Once a customer brought a loaf and complained it was stale. He appologised and said he would get a fresh but there would be a small wait. He threw some water on the loaf, cranked up the oven. Five minutes He brough the same loaf back. The customer later commented it to be the best loaf ever tasted.
Down here we just call it loaf bread. When I was growing up as a kid, we always had a loaf bread that was used for daddy to have for making sandwiches to carry to work. To go along with being poor, his sandwiches were wrapped in wax paper, and carried in a small paper sack or poke #4 -I think. He would drink water and fold the wax paper and sack up and bring them back home to be used again. We did not eat toast or cereal (corn flakes) when I was still at home, only homemade biscuits and cornbread. There was a cafeteria lady at my grammar school(in the early 60’s) that made the best yeast rolls I have ever ate. If some of these restaurants could make yeast rolls like hers, they never have to worry about going out of business. It seems to me it is getting harder and harder to buy a good soft loaf that is is not coarse or dry as cornbread. I buy the cheaper GV Walmart brand and they seem to be softer and better than the name brands and don’t cost $3-4 . I dearly love good homemade biscuits and unsweetened cornbread-I ate cornbread and milk for my supper last night.
God bless you friends of Appalachia, God bless Tipper and her family God bless Ms Cindy with healing and health in Jesus name, God bless you and your family, God bless me and my family in Jesus name, thank you God for our blessings, thank you Jesus, Amen,
My mother hates baking. Always did. She made cookies and brownies occasionally. She also made pudding desserts it those cute little pudding cups from the 1970s. But I will tell you that we never went without. She went to a bakery and bought the best bread and desserts! She always serves meals and snacks on a pretty plate and makes you feel loved. Her mother called it light bread. That always confused me until I found your blog!
As I was growing up, as new food items were advertised on TV, billboards and magazines, it was always promoted that these items were tastier, and better for you. Now, at 73 I find that the old recipes I have in cookbooks from time gone by and my grandmother’s hand written recipes taste so much better. And not so many chemicals and preservatives. To go back to the 1950’s and enjoy the smells in their Kitchens.
Praying for Miss Cindy as well as your family.
It cracks me up…light bread or white bread, aptly named ‘parts of a sandwich’. Several years ago, while in Minnesota, my hubby and I were with another couple in a rather nice restaurant. The other couple, after the server set our food down, he asked if the had some ‘light’ bread. We were astonished that she actually, up there, knew what light bread was. We still laugh at the memory. Sometime the smallest thing can bring a smile. Praying for Miss Cindy and you guys. God Bless.