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In Philadelphia, a street vendor named Daniel Christopher Kleiss sold soft pretzels as early as the 1820s,
:hmm:
In Philadelphia, a street vendor named Daniel Christopher Kleiss sold soft pretzels as early as the 1820s,
Legend has it that the pretzel was invented by an Italian monk in the year 610 A.D. To reward young children for learning their prayers, he supposedly folded strips of bread dough to resemble the crossed arms of praying children. He called his creation pretiola, which meant “little rewards."
The earliest picture and description of a pretzel (from the fifth century) may be found in the manuscript-codex No. 3867, Vatican Library.
zimmerstutzen said:According to what I read, baking soda in water when heated combines with carbon dioxide in the air and becomes Sodium carbonate (washing soda) So it may be that the baking soda is both the leavening agent as well as the basis for the listing of the sodium carbonate.
Baking soda, or sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3), is a chemical that can undergo a decomposition reaction when heated. At temperatures above 176 degrees Fahrenheit (80 degrees Celsius), sodium bicarbonate starts to break down into three compounds, forming sodium carbonate (Na2CO3), water (H2O) and carbon dioxide (CO2).
Make Sodium Carbonate
Sodium bicarbonate is CHNaO3 while sodium carbonate is Na2CO3. Simply heat baking soda or sodium bicarbonate in a 200°F oven for about an hour. Carbon dioxide and water will be given off, leaving dry sodium carbonate. This is the soda ash.
The chemical reaction for the process is:
2 NaHCO3(s) → Na2CO3(s) + CO2(g) + H2O(g)
The compound will readily absorb water, forming the hydrate (returning to baking soda). You can store the dry sodium carbonate in a sealed container or with a desiccant to keep it dry or allow it to form the hydrate, as desired.
While sodium carbonate is fairly stable, it slowly decomposes in dry air to form sodium oxide and carbon dioxide. The decomposition reaction can be accelerated by heating the washing soda to 851 °C (1124 K).
zimmerstutzen said:I did a little reading about the history of crackers. For something so rudimentary, supposedly the first were made in 1792, but they do seem a lot like flat bread which is much older. My favorite Cracker is OTC, the big round oyster crackers, made since 1848. Still hand made with the same recipe if you believe the stuff on the box. Now they are like some special gormet item and are very expensive. I remember when they were almost as cheap as saltines.
OTC® Oyster Crackers were introduced in Trenton, N.J., in 1847 by Adam Exton, an English immigrant. Exton conceived the idea of baking a cracker to be used in oyster stews. In 1848, one year after the Exton crackers arrived on the Trenton scene, Ezekiel Pullen began baking an "Original Trenton Cracker" in the kitchen of his home. He sold his crackers from the back of his wagon as he made his way along Trenton streets. Both businesses grew as a craze for oysters developed in the 1860s and 1870s. OTC ® crackers became available from wooden barrels in neighborhood stores and in seafood restaurants. During the Civil War, the Exton company supplied its crackers to the Union army.
Loyalist Dave said:Soda Ash or sodium carbonate was the original "quick leaven" until baking soda came around. A process to produce Soda Ash was patented by French Chemist LaBlanc in 1791, so..., it's technically an 18th century thing but is post AWI.
The fact one can simply change Sodium Bicarbonate into Soda Ash by baking it for a while, is very cool. My daughter has a recipe for making soft pretzels and it calls for a Sodium Carbonate solution immersion, before baking.
The stuff is also good for certain dye mordants and for removing certain grease stains or red wine stains from clothing.
LD
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HartshornHartshorn salt (ammonium carbonate), also known simply as hartshorn, and baker's ammonia, was used as a leavening agent, in the baking of cookies and other edible treats. It was used mainly in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as a forerunner of baking powder.[7] A half-teaspoon of hartshorn can substitute for one teaspoon of baking powder. It is called for in old German and Scandinavian recipes and, although rarely used in modern times, may still be purchased as a baking ingredient. Hartshorn helps molded cookies such as Springerle to retain their intricate designs during baking. Cookies made with hartshorn can be kept for a long time without hardening. Use of hartshorn may turn some ingredients, such as sunflower seeds, green.
Ammonium carbonate is especially suited to thin, dry cookies and crackers. When heated, it releases ammonia and carbon dioxide gases, but no water. The absence of water allows cookies to cook and dry out more quickly, and thinner cookies allow the pungent ammonia to escape, rather than to remain trapped, as it would in a deeper mass.
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