Fridge, for the same reason you do. I am curious about the bread boxes too!

I don't like the texture of refrigerated bread, especially home-made. We keep ours in the top drawer under where our toaster oven, peanut butter, etc. are and next to the fridge where we store sandwich meats, cheeses, produce, condiments, jelly, etc. It's not anything special or 'optimal,' just cool, dark, and dry. If we have to store it longer, it gets wrapped well and frozen. But that's rarely an issue around our house!

In the pantry cab. I don't like cold bread, plus I read years ago that keeping in fride does NOT make the bread last longer. Besides, my fridge is very small right now pre-reno and I've got too much other stuff to store in there that really does need refrigeration!

Interesting thread! I currently keep mine in the fridge under the (I now know mistaken) idea that is will last longer. I'd love to hear from those who have one of the cool, old-fashioned metal bread drawers in your cabinets. Are they worth getting? Are they a big upcharge?

We have a bread drawer because I wanted more room in the refrigerator, but we end up keeping the bread in the fridge anyway. We usually don't use it fast enough and from our experience it does keep longer in the refrigerator. So we now use the bread drawer for crackers, oatmeal, and some other misc. items.

Have you tried any bread bins. I believe Brabantia Stainless Steel Bread Bin is available for 42.05 on bluebath.com from the description of it, you can fit two large loaves in it. I'm not so familiar with bread boxes however. The bins do give your home a modern theme.

Here is a link that might be useful: Brabantia Stainless Steel Bread Bin

Our microwave doubles as a bread box. Spare loaves stay in the freezer. Frozen bread thaws out just fine but refrigerated bread is no good (in my opinion).

I have deep drawer just to the right of my appliance garage where I store my bread .It works pretty well. I'm not a fan of cold bread.

I kept ours in a drawer when we had one specifially for bread, but when we moved and didn`t have the extra drawer, I kept it on the pantry shelf. I find that refrigerating it, dried it out.

We have a "sandwich" area to make school lunches - it use to be the mudroom. We keep the bread and crackers in the middle drawer, pretzels, chips, etc in the bottom drawer, plastic bags, knives, spoons, etc. in the top drawer and peanut butter in the upper. It's one cabinet away from the frig but "outside" the normal kitchen. The toaster and 2nd microwave is located here too. Bread flies out the door here. I have to limit the kids to 6 slices of bread a day.

we got a bread drawer in one of our drawers because i hated our old bread box (the front kept falling open) and it was just one more thing on the counter. i like it. not sure how well it keeps things fresh tho.

I keep it in the fridge in the summer to make it last longer. I figured it was because of our excessive heat & humidity and I keep the thermostat at 78 in summer. Homemade bread will mold in a couple of days if left out. I try to plan it so I only bake enough for a couple of days at a time though.

We have the Brabantia bin linked above. I remember getting it for a really great price (@ BB&B???) a few yrs prior to our reno. We keep it in the pantry cab, in one of the pull-out drawers. Sandwich rolls and English muffins are stored in it. Other breads we often keep (in plastic bags) on the counter, mostly as a reminder that we have them, and need to eat them (within days, the rolls and English muffins keep longer).

I think it depends on your climate. I live in a moderate climate which usually has neutral humidity (35-65%), and the indoor climate isn't much different than outdoors. Here, the bread is much better if you don't keep it in the fridge. Fresh bread (not packaged) that has no preservatives or conditioners usually lasts at least 3-4 days before going stale and/or moldy, especially when put in a Ziplock bag on the second day (Putting it in a bag too soon seals in the moisture and makes it go moldy). Packaged bread usually lasts a good week in its own bag. If your indoor climate is a lot drier or wetter it's going to affect how well the bread lasts!

I had a narrow space between my corner unit and the floor to ceiling Advantium/cooler expanse. I had a pullout put in thinking it would be a great place to hide the oatmeal near the microwave and water. Turns out it's great for bread, cookies, and other snacks as well, so the bread either goes in there or lingers on the island.

Plllog, and others of course, are you with me that enriched bread gets grosser sooner???

I wanted to note that for me the best place to put bread is on the counter. Yep. I just toss it on the counter with a knife and maybe a little butter. I estimate it takes about...

I'm sorry. I had to stop and get bread. What was I saying?

Years ago I bought a wire rack that hangs from the second shelf up in an upper cabinet. That's where the bread goes, hanging above the plates. The link below has a similar item, 'cause it's a little difficult to explain.

I think your local humidity does have a lot to do with where your bread does well. I live in a dry climate and the Orowheat bread stays fresh in the cupboard for up to 2 weeks.

Here is a link that might be useful: under shelf basket

Dough enhancer (The one I use is a mix of Whey (a dairy protein), soy lecithin, tofu powder, citric acid, dry yeast, sea salt, spice blend, corn starch, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), natural flavor) in the dough will really help homemade bread last longer. Ours lasts a week or so without molding, if the kids let it be that long.

Here is a link that might be useful: Dough Enhancer from PleasantHillGrain.com

ROTFL!! Morgne, do you really keep the butter on the counter? Do you have a crock or soemthing? I think it would depend on what you mean by "enriched". Oh. Yes. I think when I said "dough conditioner" I meant "dough enhancer" as per Rhome. It does have the reputation of extending bread's usable life. I've noticed that Trader Joe's sliced bread, which doesn't have any ingredients I don't have in my own kitchen, lasts longer (say, a week) than La Brea Bakery or homemade whole loaves, which last the 3-4 days that TJ's say their bread will last. (Sliced usually doesn't last as well, if it doesn't have preservatives.) If you meant made with enriched flour, I think all the bought bread is. It seems to last a little longer than homemade, but I'm not comparing type to type.

That's convoluted. No, I can't say I've noticed that. I will say that although I'm much into reuse, a new Ziplock for the bread saves one from bread waste. Mold spores which aren't apparent on the old bread will still linger in the old bag. I used to use an airtight canister for bread, but if a loaf went moldy it would be a big waste of water and energy trying to de-spore the canister.

BTW, a tip I read here on GW for people without bread drawers, is to put the bread in the warming drawer. It's dry in there from heating, and pretty airtight unless you have the steam vent open. So long as the controls are on the inside, which they are for most warming drawers, you'll see the bread before you turn on the WD and singe or melt the bag.

While we're talking about bread, does anyone have anything good to make with stale ends? I find I can taste the staleness in meatballs, and there's only so much bread pudding people will look at...

@plllog, I sometimes make romesco sauce, which is yummy and easy---has enough other flavors going on that I've never noticed staleness of the bread. Also, savory bread puddings to mix it up from the sweet ones sometimes. We also do goat cheese rolled in seasoned breadcrumbs and then pan fried and added to salads, but if you can taste the staleness in the meatballs, you might in that too.

No thoughts on where to keep bread, though. In the old kitchen, it was in a bread box on top of the fridge, but that would fall off the fridge if you opened the freezer while it was open, so I don't exactly recommend it.... (It was one of the Brabantia bins, though---in white it didn't look too modern, though we got it off Freecycle so weren't too picky about it!) We go through bread fast enough that I tend to just buy it fresh once or twice a week---fortunate to live in a very bread-happy place with lots of local bakeries nearby. I don't think any of the local spots use preservatives---our bread tends to last 3-4 days. Mold isn't much of an issue here---bigger problem is just bread getting hard, so the fridge doesn't help much. I would love to find a bread box that did a decent job preventing that!

plllog, I use the ends of the loaf to make croutons. I cube the bread and toss them in melted butter in an iron skillet along with my seasonings of choice ( usually garlic salt) . I then pop them in the oven at around 300 degrees until they are toasted.They are the BEST croutons. I have served them in buffets where my guests have eaten the croutons and skipped the salad!

I've also made bread crumbs in my food processors and stirred the crumbs in melted butter in a similar manner. My family loves the buttered bread crumbs on macaroni and cheese.

I used a brabantia bread bin in my previous kitchen and found that bread seemed to mold faster in there than when just sitting in a bag on the counter. This was especially true if two loaves were stored in the bid. In my new kitchen I use the cabinet that goes down to the counter, made to store my mixer. There is enough room on the side to slide in the loaves. However, I am liking the idea of the warming drawer and might try that to see if it works better for us.

I was able to find a plastic basket at the dollar store that fits perfectly in our microwave, and I throw all the bread, rolls, etc. in there. The basket makes it easy to keep everything together when I have to use the microwave.

I also keep my butter on the counter, I have one of those butter keepers where you put cold water in the bottom part and the butter is in a separate dish above. It keeps it fresh and no more rock hard butter that's impossible to spread.

Thanks everyone! Even got some bonus ideas here, such as the butter keeper.

I use ends of bread for croutons too. I have tried dividing loaves into smaller pieces and freezing them. With just the two of us we don't use bread that fast. But you have to remember to defrost it ahead of when you need it, and I usually forget.

I grew up with a bread drawer and decided I would have one in my new kitchen. The only thing different from a regular drawer is it has a wooden slider top, it's not metal. Right now the bread is in a basket on top of the fridge which is probably one of the hottest places in the kitchen (since heat rises and it's right next to the stove on top of an electical appliance giving off heat). Freash bread doesn't last more then 2 or 3 days up there, but store bread will last a bit longer. Luckily we eat it fairly fast.

But at my parents house we used the bread drawers for cereal, chips, crackers, etc... so that's my plan for this bread drawer as well. I doubt it'll do much to keep the bread any longer then normal though.

Don't keep your bread in the fridge, it makes it go stale immediately! It's a chemical reaction that is hastened by cold. It should always be stored in a dark, room temperature, air tight place.

We keep ours in the pantry cabinet, but my family eats it long before it can go stale. At the shore cottage we rented they had a "brisker", a heated breadbox that kept crackers and cereal from getting mushy in the humidity. Wouldn't want to put bread in it, though.

In the summer in Arizona, it is kept in the refrigerator. It mold's real fast left out. But in the what they call our winter's it can stay out in a basket on the counter.

An enameled steel breadbox! A good one should have air holes punched in it. My grandmother had a metal-lined bread drawer (farm, vermin), and it had breathing holes in the sliding top, too.

I have to laugh at the differences in perspective, which obviously impact how folks in different climates store their perishables -- when I read marci8's comment "I keep the thermostat at 78 in summer", my first reaction was "Why on EARTH would someone turn the furnace on in the summer to make it that hot inside?!" (I live in Maine.)

My beloved vintage German breadbox, at toasting and sandwich station:

I still don't get this! I want to know!! It's one of those eternal kitchen questions I never feel are really answered!

If your bread comes in a plastic bag, whether it's grocery store Roman Meal, or organic from Whole Foods, or bagged from the neighborhood artisan bakery, why would it matter WHAT kind of bin it's in provided that it's not hot? I would really like to know. As a former German breadbin owner, I never got the point... were you supposed to take it out of the bag? It seemed like the only thing I achieved with the breadbin was hiding bread clutter. So I got rid of it and use a cabinet. Too much room on the countertop in my tiny kitchen.

My aunt has a fancy bread drawer and she loves it, but the bread is still there in plastic bags, so what's the difference?

We use sandwich bread sometimes fast, sometimes slow. If I think it's gonna be slow I freeze 1/2 loaf and leave other half out. No defrosting that way. I do sometimes resort to the fridge, but then it's only ok for toasting or french toast in the a.m.

Artisan bread we chow down same day and IMMEDIATELY FREEZE. The thaw on the counter and slowly reheat in foil.

I want to know the secret of the bread drawer.

Zilla, the secret of the German breadbin is probably German bread. It's got a very nice thick crust, no chemicals at all in it, and is sold either without wrapping or wrapped in brown paper.

Lacking real German bread -- alas! -- we get ours from the local bakery wrapped in brown paper, and just leave it in that paper and toss it into the bin. The bin keeps it from drying out too quickly, which is our main bread issue.

I've rarely gotten bread in plastic bags, so don't really know how that's supposed to work - doesn't it get moldy faster smothered in plastic that doesn't breathe? I wouldn't leave it in plastic in the bin, in any case.

Not sure that this really helps solve the mystery, but there you are.

I responded a while ago, but now I see that my last message got rejected.

Don't have it in me to write it all again, but I guess it's if you have baguettes/scones/muffin in paper or loose that you want to make last & eat in 2-3 days they may last in brabantia bin or german breadbox or special drawer... better than in other kinds of storage.

If you're going to have chemical-laced Roman Meal or other plastic bagged English muffins, etc., it's probably not worthy of any place other than obvious cool/dark ones.

Am I on the right track?

Liz (who has no room for any dedicated bread storage anyway, but likes thinking about it)

lol liz - sorry, you caught me displaying my obnoxious bread bigotry. It's just sheer luck we live within walking distance of a good bread baker.

The thing that marked the cultural kitchen shift away from metal-lined breadboxes and oldfashioned brabantia-type bins was the advent of preservatives, right? So modern breads with preservatives in them clearly have different needs. DO they mold *faster* in breadboxes perhaps?

What do preservatives do? Keep mold away longer? Keep bread moist longer? Maintain the taste longer? I realize I don't really know.

Kitchen chemists, please step up and advise!

Oh, I definitely think it's about shelf life, moistness, etc.

When was the last time a real baguette got moldy???

But those processed hamburger buns sitting on the shelf in the summer sure can.

We use both kinds in our house. Our formula for our family of 5 is to pick up the fabulous Rustic Italian loaf during the day, eat what we want at dinner, and freeze what's left immediately. Otherwise it'd be hard as a rock the next day.

But we're no stranger to a Thomas' English muffin either (BTW they eliminated high fructose corn syrup and they still taste great but there's definitely a texture difference)

Plllog,

I DO keep the current butter on the counter. I use organic saltless butter (the kind that comes in sticks or cubes) and I use that for all my buttering/baking/cooking so it goes very quickly. So no opportunity to go bad!

But if I have a special butter, say an almond or honey butter, then I do have several "butter keepers" I keep on hand. I like the french style with the sort of mushroom shape where the lid hangs over the sides.

I only have one 24" undercounter refridgerator and even it is empty most of the time. I kinda think cold food is weird! It has less smell and doesn't open up your taste buds the same way so it doesn't have the same tastes that the same food does at room temperature.

There are only two of us, so we put bread in the freezer to keep it fresh. Putting it in the refrigerator keeps it from getting moldy, but the flavor and texture aren't as good.

I don't think breadboxes were used to maintain freshness at all, but they do look tidier than a collection of loaves, half loaves, and heels sitting around on the counter.

Probably more importantly, they were mouse proof.

I got a metal bread bin with a flat top so I could keep stuff on top of it too - I used it for bread for a while but now mostly keep onions in it. Here is my tip for storing half eaten baguettes: wrap in plastic wrap and put in tall narrow glass vase (from the florist shop) with open end in first! Keeps it pretty fresh!

ours either goes in the microwave or in the gas oven. it has pilot lights, so keeps it from getting moist and moldy. most artisanal breads last as long as the loaf holds out in this house--and we keep the butter in a keeper on the counter next to the toaster oven too.
we also have about fifty loaves of frozen bread, thanks to some giftgivers. i just gave two (and a homemade quart of bean and ham soup)to the neighbor who hung my chandelier for me today!

Bemused by Morgne, I again say that the climate matters--a lot. Butter left out here (no fancy crock) gets nasty in a few hours. Some foods are much more flavorful at room temperature, but I'm currently snacking on some lovely yellow cherry sized tomatoes that are tastier cold. We refrigerate all roots including tubers and aliums, or they go soft and moldy right away. But the bread keeps as well as can be expected in a plastic bag on the counter.

Zillapgh, It's probably clear already, but to answer your question precisely: I also usually buy breads that don't have wrappers, or have paper, or homemade, but most of this discussion is about where to put the bread in its plastic bag besides out on the counter (though some are happy with out on the counter). We had a breadbox when I was growing up, but it was inside of a cupboard. Some people have a breadbox on a counter, or fitted in a drawer. I still have a flexible (like tupperware is) plastic breadbox somewhere from when I lived abroad, in the countryside. It's not tightly sealed by a longshot, but did seem to keep the bread better. That was all bakery made bread sold without any bag, but I usually put it in the inferior plastic bags I had. I don't know if the box keeps the bread cool, or what. For sure, the tradition of metal boxes is for keeping out bugs and varmints. Mice will go for flour or bread long before they'll turn to cheese. In general, a cupboard or drawer, or pantry, or microwave or oven or warming drawer, or breadbox or canister or vase, will work. A basket or plastic bag or bread board will keep it off the counter and out of the (potential) muck. The fridge will induce staling because the cold tightens the starch molecules. This can be counteracted, temporarily by heating/toasting, which loosens the starch molecules. And, of course, bread should be kept out of direct sunlight. As to the rest, you're right. Once it's in a good quality plastic bag, it's all pretty much the same. :)

Plllog,

It could entirely be related to location. I've lived in the sierra mountains but I was too young to be making butter decisions at that point, Phoenix where the indoor temperature has always been a cool 68 via the miracle of AC, and my current location Portland where even at it's warmest it just aint that warm.

When I was 15? or 16? one of the first jobs I ever had was at a sewing/fabric store here in town. And I had the great pleasure of working closely with a newly arrived young french woman newly in the states. An avid seamstress we were talking about her newly made wool suit and I mentioned that I prefered not to own much that was complicated to launder. She surprised me by going on a mild rant about how weird "the states" were. All of us, she noted, with our prewashing of dishes so that we could not wash the dishes, cleaning laundry without water so that we didn't have to clean ourselves, First buying too much food in advance that that it was less valuable in the forms of minerals, then paying to store that food as it gradually becomes worth less, then eating only a portion of that food and throwing away the rest. She pointed to me and said "If you buy an extra yard and prewash the wool then you can wash your clothing in water YOURSELF. No chemicals, no dropping off and picking up, no nothing."

I have never, ever, forgotten that conversation. And over the years I've come to agree with her. We are, in many ways, a country that simply doesn't have 800 years of yogurt making history... so when someone puts milk in a pottery jar on the counter wrapped in a sweater it's "disgusting" but we buy it by the ton if it says yoplait on the side.

Myself, I really don't have left over bread. If we are going to eat a half a loaf of bread I make one and share with a neighbor. If I need to make two, then theres a half for us, the two neighbors and the people I work with. But since I stock no food and keep no left overs it means that out of that 24" fridge (which takes roughly 16 bucks a year to run, near as I can figure out) with two drawers, the bottom one is almost always empty.

It works for us! I don't have kids or even pets though. A cat might keep me from leaving the butter out or giving away all the bread.

Cool, Morgne! Thanks for the backstory! My stale ends of bread come from poor planning. Like if I knew the whole loaf wouldn't be eaten, I could have frozen half (or given it away), but there's way too much spontaneity in my life. I've also lived with a miniature fridge and a couple of drawers, so can relate a little. But when I moved back all I wanted was a garbage disposal and dishwasher. I guess I'm just too American. :)

An aside: Did you hear about the woman who wanted to make a blue blazer, so the fabric store clerk found her some nice fabric, and was looking for a pattern that wasn't too hard. There was a Simplicity with good lines, but the customer rejected it because it was for a red jacket. [True punchline, some story details are reconstructed.]

My mom has one of those drawers with the metal lid (to keep out varmits), which I recall quite impressed us when we moved into that house, back in the 60's.....I now live in Hawaii, where anything left on the counter turns to mush/mold. We just try to eat our bread fast or buy small amounts, or freeze the leftovers. The climate is good for ripening avocado and bananas, not so good for leaving onions or tomatoes out. We had a Jack O Lantern for Halloween, it was carved on the 31st and had moldy spots on his face by Tues.

I'm excited to have a designated bread drawer in my new kitchen. Until now we have just kept it on the counter by the microwave.

I also keep butter on the counter. We have 2 of those little butter crocks to fill with water, but people kept forgetting it in there, not changing the water, the butter would fall into the water, etc, etc. So now it's just on the plate.

Morgne, I am fascinated by I really don't have left over bread. If we are going to eat a half a loaf of bread I make one and share with a neighbor.

Per meal? Per day? People eat bread for 1 to 3 meals a day in our house. I make 5 loaves at a time and they last 3 to 5 days, and I start over. I can't imagine going through all the work to mix a batch of dough and making 1 loaf. So you have me wondering. I always like to know how others approach things. :-)