Also, AFAIK they don't add iron shavings to it

I'm afraid to ask?

The form of iron "supplementation" universally added to flour in the US is little more than that. There's some theories that this impacts gut bacteria, particularly the ones associated with B-vitamin.

Iron shavings -> bad bacteria -> poor Vitamin B status -> intestinal lining damage -> celiac, allergies and autoimmune

TLDR; bread in the US makes people sick, not in Europe

<rant>

Bread in the USA is an abomination. There. I said it.

Any bread in the normal isle that you can buy and have on your counter for over a week, where it still looks and feels and tastes the same is an abomination.

It is not bread. It is a super-processed food which makes you initially feel full but digests very rapidly, leaving you hungry again.

100 calories of engineered US bread compared to 100 calories of steel cut oats is a good example. The latter will keep you full much longer.

I remember going to an actual bakery in Belgium, you know, the guy who wakes up at 3AM to make bread. Get a fresh bread. Still warm. If you leave it on the counter for 2 days it is rock hard. Because it is unprocessed (or at least a lot less).

I guess we have to thank Kroger for putting the bakeries in the US out of business.

Wonder 'bread'. I wonder if it's bread...

</rant>

I remember my first trip to Germany, would pick up off the shelf supermarket bread, white, wheat, whatever. It was great. Especially pretzels. I ate so much bread, and was surprised at how much regularly I was still pooping. I'm not even going to touch on local bakeries, because that shit was fucking fantastic.

But in the U.S, we're forced to be the slaves of Metamucil to poop. Eat white bread here and you basically have cotton stuck up your ass. Good luck.

> I remember going to an actual bakery in Belgium, you know, the guy who wakes up at 3AM to make bread. Get a fresh bread. Still warm. If you leave it on the counter for 2 days it is rock hard. Because it is unprocessed (or at least a lot less).

> I guess we have to thank Kroger for putting the bakeries in the US out of business.

While I agree with you about typical bread found in US grocery stores, there are plenty of small bakeries in the US that make "real" bread. Every city or even decently-sized town that I've been in had a least one solid bakery with bread/pastries/etc baked fresh every day. Find them and support them!

They exist in some cities, sure, but across wide swathes of the country, they are nowhere to be found. The craft is dead, and in its place we have industry and logistics.

Where I see 'real' bread for sale in the US, it is marketed as a luxury good for the affluent, and the price reflects this. I see this as scandalous - charging a premium for what I would consider ordinary 'natural' food.

What really pains me is that an ordinary loaf of industrial spongebread at Walmart costs the same as a very high quality (and heavier/denser) loaf of proper bread (such as a standard Mischbrot) at a bake shop in Germany. It's obscene given that labor and especially energy costs are considerably higher in Germany, so it isn't like comparing a US price to a dirt cheap low-wage country.

I have noticed that since the pandemic there seems to be a lot more interest in quality home baking in the US, but it seems that people are rediscovering fire in a vacuum without any real training or knowledge - because the traditional craft is dead.

I am growing a little spelt in the garden this year from organic seed sourced in Germany. If it works, I will save my new seed and try it on a larger scale next year.

Most grocery stores have a "fresh" bread section where they're at least giving it the final bake in the store. Some grocery stores have quite competent bread selection.

Yes but it's all squishy. Bread is not supposed to have that texture, ever. I can only guess that most Americans object to actually having to chew their food.

> Any bread in the normal isle that you can buy and have on your counter for over a week, where it still looks and feels and tastes the same is an abomination.

Sourdough does exist and keeps well.