coot
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Post by coot on Mar 23, 2020 19:37:21 GMT -7
I am currently reading A Naval History of Britain 660-1649, and have come across an account of the making of ship's bread - which while written in a letter dated 1623, likely would apply for a hundred or two years on either side of that date. The letter refers to the need of time to victual a ship. In part, it reads "as the wheat to be bought, ground, bolted, bracked, made in cakes, baked, cooled, culled, bagged, weighed". Does anyone know what was meant by "bolted" and "bracked" in the making of ship's bread (hardtack)?
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Post by spence on Mar 23, 2020 19:49:19 GMT -7
Can't help you with bracked, but bolting is sieving/filtering ground grain through a cloth to get the finest bit out, the flour. Bolting cloth is a common term.
Spence
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coot
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Post by coot on Mar 23, 2020 20:02:08 GMT -7
Thanks for the response. Apparently "bolting" flour is an old term for what would later be called "sifting" - which I can remember my grandmother doing. Every time I try to search for "bracking" in relation to making bread, it only gives references to "breaking bread".
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Post by brokennock on Mar 23, 2020 20:21:52 GMT -7
Thanks for the response. Apparently "bolting" flour is an old term for what would later be called "sifting" - which I can remember my grandmother doing. Every time I try to search for "bracking" in relation to making bread, it only gives references to "breaking bread". From your the quote in your o.p. it is the wheat that is "bracked." When I look up bracked wheat I don't get any verbs, I get many recipes for a type of cake or bread to go with tea. This offers some explanation, www.kingarthurflour.com/blog/2010/03/14/irelands-deep-dark-secret-tea-brack |
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Post by brokennock on Mar 23, 2020 20:28:38 GMT -7
Definition of brack (Entry 4 of 4) 1 archaic : a crack or fissure in a solid body : break, breach. 2 dialectal : a flaw especially in cloth. www.merriam-webster.com › ... Brack | Definition of Brack by Merriam-Webster So, I'm thinking they are cracking and coarsely grinding the wheat. Given the previous mention of brack being a form of the Gaelic word for speckled, this would seem to tie into the King Arthur flour link. Except that the quote lists grinding separately. Maybe they are dividing the wheat, thus the word for fissure or crack? It will be a few days before I can speak with him, but, we have a family friend who was Dean of Linguistics at Central Connecticut State college. I will ask him. |
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coot
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Posts: 152
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Post by coot on Mar 24, 2020 11:45:13 GMT -7
The original list has the wheat 1st bought, then ground, then "bolted" (sifted to break up any clumps in the ground flour) and then "bracked" before being made into cakes and baked, so "bracking" was something (inquiring minds want to know what) that took place after the grinding of the wheat & sifting of the flour but before "being made into cakes (I assume mixed with water & a bit of salt & formed) & then baked.
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Post by spence on Mar 24, 2020 17:42:20 GMT -7
Oxford English Dictionary gives brack as "adjective: salt, brachish noun: salt water, the sea."
I'm going to speculate that they bought, ground, bolted, salted, made in cakes, baked, cooled, culled, bagged, weighed.
Ships biscuits have only flour and salt, I believe, so it fits.
Spence
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Post by brokennock on Mar 24, 2020 22:17:31 GMT -7
Oxford English Dictionary gives brack as "adjective: salt, brachish noun: salt water, the sea." I'm going to speculate that they bought, ground, bolted, salted, made in cakes, baked, cooled, culled, bagged, weighed. Ships biscuits have only flour and salt, I believe, so it fits. Spence Might they have used salt water to form the flour into a dough? |
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coot
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Posts: 152
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Post by coot on Mar 25, 2020 9:11:18 GMT -7
Oxford English Dictionary gives brack as "adjective: salt, brachish noun: salt water, the sea." I'm going to speculate that they bought, ground, bolted, salted, made in cakes, baked, cooled, culled, bagged, weighed. Ships biscuits have only flour and salt, I believe, so it fits. Spence Might they have used salt water to form the flour into a dough? I think that Spence has the likely answer - that "bracking" meant to add salt to the flour after sifting & before forming into cakes to be baked. I doubt that salt (sea) water was used as there would then be no way of knowing whether there would be too much or too little salt in the finished bread. Salt being a pajor trade good for thousands of years, I believe that bagged salt would have been readily available & that the bread would have been made with "x" amount of salt per "y" amount of flour. |
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Post by brokennock on Mar 25, 2020 10:07:46 GMT -7
I meant salt water that was man made.
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coot
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Posts: 152
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Post by coot on Mar 25, 2020 11:55:29 GMT -7
I am not enough of a cook/baker (luckily my wife keeps me from starving) to know if there would be any difference in the end result if you added salt to the flour & then added water, or if you added salt to the water & then into the flour - to my completely untrained eye, it would work either way.
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Post by spence on Mar 25, 2020 12:27:44 GMT -7
To most modern palates the ratio of 1/2 teaspoon of salt to 1 cup of flour makes the right taste. That will hold true day in and day out. The amount of water to make bread dough to the right consistency, though, is not a fixed thing. It depends much on the humidity, and can be quite different day to day. So, yes, you could add the salt to the water instead of the flour, but you would lose control of the slat/flour ratio, because the amount of salted water needed would vary constantly. I have no doubt they put the salt in the flour, not in the water...but I wasn't there, so what do I know?  Spence |
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