Salt rising bread – Feedback
I was so excited to read the salt rising bread story! ["Rising Again: Two women are bringing back the regional specialty that is salt rising bread" by Bob Batz Jr., Food Flavor, Nov. 3]. I was actually thinking about salt rising bread a few weeks ago — I believe it was around the same time I discovered that my husband had never eaten fried apples before, and then realized that they might be a West Virginia-specific food.
Anyway, that got me to thinking of some of the other foods I often ate growing up that I haven’t had in ages, which made me think of salt rising bread.
This was my grandfather’s preferred bread for toast, sandwiches and snacks. It came in perfectly square loaves wrapped in wax paper, and slipped inside a narrow plastic bag. My grandmother bought it at the regular grocery store in Arlington, Va. Having eaten it in the Washington, D.C., area in the 1980s, I don’t associate it with West Virginia in my mind, but I clearly remember my grandfather telling me it was what he “grew up eating” and that there was “nothing better.”
I had been thinking that a good winter baking project would be to track down a recipe online and trying making it! And of course, I’ve been assuming that salt must be a key ingredient. I’ll still plan to make it this winter — but in the meantime I plan to stop by the Rising Creek Bakery and purchase a loaf or two of salt rising bread on our next trip down to West Virginia!
Please feel free to share this letter with the Susan Brown featured in your story, as my grandfather (R.R. Boone) grew up on a small farm just outside of Ronceverte, W.Va., in the early 1900s.
MARTHA RIECKS
Highland Park (originally from Charleston, W.Va.)
What a surprise to open my Post-Gazette to find an article from my hometown. I have lived in Bridgeville for 36 years, but was born and raised in Mt. Morris.
I still have family there and had just been there the day before and had visited the now famous Rising Creek Bakery to purchase a loaf of what else, salt rising bread. My salt rising bread memory is from my childhood when my Aunt Hazel Fox used to make the “starter.” My cousin Ellen and I used to watch her get it ready and set it on the gas range, where there was a pilot light to make it rise.
Hazel was a sister-in-law to Pearl Haines, who is mentioned in the article. Pearl’s mother, Ethel Fox, was the one who taught Hazel and Pearl to make the bread. It has come down through at least three generations.
My cousin Ellen Trout, Hazel’s daughter, still makes it for family and friends. It is nice to be able to stop in at Rising Creek whenever I go home for a visit and pick up an old family favorite. I like it toasted. If you use a quarter to a half loaf in your turkey stuffing, you will be AMAZED at the unique delicious flavor. I commend the ladies at Rising Creek for putting Mt. Morris on the map for a “good thing.” Thank you for publishing the article.
BONNIE HENDERSHOT
Bridgeville (originally from Charleston, W.Va.)
With your great story about salt rising bread, you brought back some memories that had been dormant for a long time.
In the early 1950s, I was a daily passenger on the Harmony Short Line bus (a memory of its own, as the bus line is long gone) to and from art classes in Downtown Pittsburgh. For reasons I never figured out, my mother relished salt rising bread and so I was the designated salt rising bread delivery service from the only Downtown bakery that we knew of that made that particular variety of bread. Needless to say, while I was riding on the crowded outbound rush-hour bus back to Zelienople, I was well aware of the salt rising bread aroma, as was everyone else on the crowded bus. Nobody ever complained aloud to me, but there was no way to escape notice and I am sure that many folks griped under their breath and to each other. Maybe they were just upset that they didn’t have a loaf of salt rising bread to take home.
JOYCE M. BESSOR
Zelienople
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