Graham bread is a name for whole wheat bread that was inspired by the teachings of famous health reformer
Sylvester Graham
Sylvester Graham (July 5, 1794 – September 11, 1851) was an American Presbyterian minister and dietary reformer known for his emphasis on vegetarianism, the temperance movement, and eating whole-grain bread. His preaching
inspired the graha ...
.
History
Sylvester Graham was a 19th-century health reformer who argued that a
vegetarian
Vegetarianism is the practice of abstaining from the consumption of meat ( red meat, poultry, seafood, insects, and the flesh of any other animal). It may also include abstaining from eating all by-products of animal slaughter.
Vegetaria ...
diet, anchored by bread that was baked at home from flour that was made from
whole wheat flour, was part of a healthful lifestyle that could prevent disease.
In 1837, Graham published the popular book ''Treatise on Bread and Bread-Making'', which included a history of bread and described how to make Graham bread, though the passage is absent of any exact measurements and instead calls upon the baker's "good judgment." It was reprinted in 2012 by
Andrews McMeel Publishing, as a selection of its American Antiquarian Cookbook Collection.
Like
Graham crackers, Graham bread was high in
fiber
Fiber or fibre (from la, fibra, links=no) is a natural or artificial substance that is significantly longer than it is wide. Fibers are often used in the manufacture of other materials. The strongest engineering materials often incorpora ...
and made from
graham flour
Graham flour is a type of coarse-ground flour of whole wheat named after Sylvester Graham. It is similar to conventional whole-wheat flour in that both are made from the whole grain, but graham flour is ground more coarsely. It is not sifted ( ...
free from the chemical
additives that were common in
white bread at that time such as
alum
An alum () is a type of chemical compound, usually a hydrated double sulfate salt of aluminium with the general formula , where is a monovalent cation such as potassium or ammonium. By itself, "alum" often refers to potassium alum, with t ...
and
chlorine
Chlorine is a chemical element with the symbol Cl and atomic number 17. The second-lightest of the halogens, it appears between fluorine and bromine in the periodic table and its properties are mostly intermediate between them. Chlorine is ...
. He argued that these chemical additives were unwholesome.
[
]
See also
* Graham crackers, also inspired by Graham
*Graham flour
Graham flour is a type of coarse-ground flour of whole wheat named after Sylvester Graham. It is similar to conventional whole-wheat flour in that both are made from the whole grain, but graham flour is ground more coarsely. It is not sifted ( ...
* Brown bread, a bread that was considered undesirable in early 19th century Europe
* Whole wheat flour
* Flour bleaching agent
* Health food
* Horsebread, a medieval European coarse bread that may have additionally contained the husks or chaff of the grains as well as legumes
A legume () is a plant in the family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seed of such a plant. When used as a dry grain, the seed is also called a pulse. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consumption, for livestock fo ...
* Maida flour, example of a bleached flour used in India
References
American breads
Whole wheat breads
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