| San Francisco Bread Review | Safeway Artisan Sour Dough bread |
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| Summary | |
| Appearance : | Mediocre |
| Taste : | Average |
| Overall grade : | C+ |
| Pictures | |
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| The bread | |
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| The wrapper | |
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| Nutrition | |
| Click on the photos for larger view | |
| Bread name | Artisan Sour Dough bread |
| Baker | Safeway, Pleasanton |
| Purchased | Tuesday, May 13, 2003, 2:30PM |
| From | Safeway, 20629 Redwood Road, Castro Valley |
| Tested | Tuesday, May 13, 2003, 6:30PM |
| Price | $1.49 |
| Weight | 16.5 oz. |
| Size (LxWxH) | 7.5" x 7" x 4.5" |
Appearance
The bread comes in a brown paper bag with nutrition information and ingredients (see pictures). I don't know why Safeway finds it necessary to spell sourdough in two words, but who am I to argue? This is a big bubble of a loaf, almost spherical, with funny bumps on top. The color is rather light, unusually so for a sourdough. The bread is surprisingly light. The crust is harder than I would have thought, almost crunchy. The outside smell is underwhelming, faint with traces of sweetness which are really uncalled for. The bottom has a definite sweet smell, that is a turn-off for me. The cut is easy, but it's hard to make good-looking slices because the loaf tends to collapse pretty easily when you cut. The crumb is very white, with two cavernous bubbles that looked like they extended at least halfway into the bread. Perhaps that explains why it feels so light. The inside smell is relatively strong, and distinctly sourdough. No trace of sweetness here (thank goodness).
Taste
The consistency of the crust is, well, frankly unpleasant. And here is that sweet taste rearing its ugly head. The crumb is very much sourdough, but very soft and fluffy. The taste is OK otherwise, more sourdoughy than I expected for an industrial bread. Long sourdough aftertaste.
Ingredients
I still see too many additives in this bread, but I have seen much worse. Why would I want fumaric acid and thiamin mononitrate in my bread?
Conclusion
The fairly strong sourdough flavor is the only redeeming point of this bread. Otherwise it is a bland boring industrial loaf with little texture and an unpleasant sweet trace at the surface.