or: Bread Slicing 101

I have spent a large portion of this year in French or formerly French colonies. There are quite a few upsides (probably 974 of them) to this including a marginal improvement in my French comprehension. My spoken French is an entirely different story. I could be jailed for massacring what is a beautiful sounding language.

Anyway, the main upside is all of these places seem to have bypassed the Low/No Carb Diet and have continued eating amazing breads with what can only be described as an obsession.

Most have their favourite bakeries and buy bread fresh every day, there are no frozen loaves, sandwiches kept in the freezer or left on the bench from the day before for these people, they make time each morning to buy fresh.

Not only that, many also go back to their local boulangerie for another baguette later in the day either for lunch or dinner and sometimes both.

This is all to say I’ve been eating quite a bit of bread (and pastries) over the last year.

What I haven’t learnt is the best way to cut it.

It has taken a stay with my family who own a bakery / patisserie / coffee shop, back in Australia, to finally teach me how to do this well.

It is so simple that I’m almost embarrassed. I’m not though because I have had slices cut for me from quite a few people over the years who clearly don’t know the secret either.

It’s not like I’ve never been shown how to cut bread before now. It’s just that all those methods (yes, I have been shown multiple times) have been ineffective for me unless what  edible doorstops, something you could stick behind wheels of a car to stop it from rolling in the wrong direction when your handbrake doesn’t work (that’s for a particularly hard loaf of bread), to hold a window open by having it rest on the windowsill or for a display on how a slice shouldn’t look, were what was actually required.

These can all be good for bread and butter pudding though but I digress…

In short, I am one of the main reasons the bread slicer was invented.

If you are like me before my most recent lesson, brace yourself, your unintentional doorstop cutting days are now over.

You may find this hard to believe, but it really works. One simple thing makes all the difference. Aside from the knife. Obviously you’re already using a bread knife. That’s why it’s called a bread knife. You’re not using a steak knife to cut bread are you? The steak knife has that name for another reason…

Now that the knife is sorted, you’re ready.

Prepare to have your mind blown…

Then roll the loaf of bread onto its side.

Cut.

It really is that simple.

Your doorstop cutting days are now over.

You’re welcome.

* Thanks to Phil Collins for the title to this post. He has a book out now called Not Dead Yet: The Autobiography I haven’t read it so no review.