What is a bread, actually? Basically, bread is made up of 4 main ingredients. First: flour, Whole wheat or refined, Second: water. The flour is kneaded into a dough using water. We do the same while making rotis. Third: salt. And fourth: yeast. The purpose of putting salt in breads. There are three main reasons. First, salt is a natural antioxidant. It works as a natural preservative that enables us to store the bread longer. Second, the taste of the bread improves with salt. Third, and most importantly, the gluten strands strengthen with salt.
The first stage of the process is kneading the dough. When you do this, the gluten in the flour, come together so that the bread or the roti, remain in one piece. Putting salt in the dough strengthens the gluten strands.
Then comes our fourth ingredient, Yeast. It is a single-celled microorganism included in the fungi group. In Hindi, it is known as Khameer. When these microorganisms react with the carbohydrates in the flour, two components are released. Ethanol and Carbon Dioxide. As you already know from school, this process is known as Fermentation. The carbon dioxide bubbles that are released in this reaction, get trapped in the gluten strands. This is why bread expands. In the bread, there are numerous round and oval bubbles in the bread.
