Unintentional bread experiment

[memaquay]

Just sent a shout out to my east coast relatives to see if they can still get it.

 

[memaquay]

This is an American link one of our canoetripping members sent me.
http://stores.bentscookiefactory.com/hardtack-cracker/

 

[Alan Gage]

Looks like you can buy all you want here: http://www.canadianfavourites.com/Purity_Sweet_Bread_900g_p/purity013.htm

 

[memaquay]

Good find! Geeze, the interweb is costing me lots lately!

 

[Alan Gage]

Good find! Geeze, the interweb is costing me lots lately!

If you go to Purity's website you can view all their other offerings as well as retailers that carry their products listed by province.

Alan

 

[Boatman53]

My Norwegian MIL gave us some Kalles products. Just finished them in fact. Couple of different kinds, even cheese and mayo in a tube. Kind of strange at first, but handy.
Jim

 

[oldie moldy]

Mike, Just for fun why don't you take one of those crackers and wet it and just see if anything will grow from it? It may be absolutely inert, maybe a secret government project to re-cycle plastic waste.
Truly, I'd be very troubled that the cockroaches didn't touch it. Those little guys are survivors and don't pass on anything useful.

Rob

 

[SlowTom]

Now we will never know how many years it would have remained stable in that original packaging....

 

[Odyssey]

I stand corrected. I misread the product listing, where no preservatives was an option for product search. Only the oatmeal is additive free. I'm still amazed at the longevity of this stuff. I wondered if the next step in the experiment might be repurposing this "food" as an edged tool. That way, not only might it take the edge off your hunger, but also...oh forget about it.
They make handy paper weights. Door stops. Pet rock bread thins.

 

[Guest]

Mike, Just for fun why don't you take one of those crackers and wet it and just see if anything will grow from it?

Done.

I have the air-exposed pendent and four bagged pieces, two single bagged, two double bagged, all which, no kidding, still feel and appear edible.

Seriously, none are yet “crackers”, even the pendant one. The four bagged one feel exactly like they do a day out of the store, mysteriously moist and pliable breadlike.

I did sniff one of the bagged pieces and it maybe smells a little funky, or that may just be a psychosomatic reaction to sniffing 4 month old bread.

One sandwich round is now hanging damp and exposed in my shop. To provide a head starter I used water from the shop cat’s bowl to moisten it.

Now we will never know how many years it would have remained stable in that original packaging....

That original packaging is sealed air-tight. I’m thinking millennia.

 

[oldie moldy]

No matter what else a person says about those bread/cracker things, this discussion is helping us get through February and for that I'm thankful!
But just don't ask me to eat one!

Rob

 

[ppine]

Expiration dates are a guide. Use them that way.

I had a professor in grad school that was a soil genesis expert. He was Italian and spent lots of time in the Arctic. He told the story of getting caught in bad weather on a glacier near Baffin Island with a German guy. They spent many days waiting for a plane that never showed up. They were able to walk out finally to the salt water and found a small shack built by Amundsen during an expedition in 1914. They melted ice for water and ate some of the pilot biscuits that were 100 years old.

 

[balto charlie]

Salt is also bread preservative so my guess is your bread is loaded with it. Plus this bread has 'aged' through winter, doubt you will get that much shelf life in summer

. There has been recent news about our (U.S.) expiration dates on foods. Many feel we throw out food way before it is expired including milk, eggs, medicines etc. I always eat eggs past their date, milk I sniff before I throw it our, leftovers good for at least a week, often 10 days. Whiskey only gets better.

 

[Guest]

Salt is also bread preservative so my guess is your bread is loaded with it. Plus this bread has 'aged' through winter, doubt you will get that much shelf life in summer

There has been recent news about our (U.S.) expiration dates on foods. Many feel we throw out food way before it is expired including milk, eggs, medicines etc. I always eat eggs past their date, milk I sniff before I throw it our, leftovers good for at least a week, often 10 days. Whiskey only gets better.

OK, I still have 5 pieces of the “Best by 10/4/14” Arnold Sandwich Round experiment.

From right to left:



A string-hung, continually air exposed sandwich round that has been wetted in the cat watering dish and later dunked in a scummy turtle tank to provide a good bacteria host. Kind of cracker crispy, but no visible mold.

A string-hung air exposed piece that was never abused with cat saliva or turtle crap. Not nearly as cracker like, still a little bread squishy, no mold.

A single round in a zip-lock bag. As pliable as the day I bought it, no mold and it still smells faintly breadlike.

Two pieces in the original “Sandwich Thin” zip lock, inside another zip lock. Those two pieces feel, smell and look just like the day I bought them. I’d eat them if I didn’t know better. I do….

I see no reason to continue to festoon the shop with dangling sandwich rounds. Those things are the real freaking Wonder Bread, as impervious as cockroaches surviving a nuclear explosion.