The LuLac Edition #5, 633 April 19th, 2026

 

DON’T PUT THE 

BREAD IN THE FRIDGE

 

When a lot of people buy bread, they don’t want it to mold. Some put it in the fridge. That is not a good thing.

Plastic doesn't just fail to keep bread fresh. It actively makes it worse. In two different ways. At the same time.

When you seal bread in a plastic bag, you're trapping moisture inside.

Bread naturally releases water vapor after baking. It's part of the cooling process that continues for days. The crumb is roughly 45 percent water. The crust is dry. And moisture is always moving from the inside out.

In open air, that moisture escapes harmlessly but In plastic, it has nowhere to go.

So it condenses. On the crust. On the inside of the bag where little water droplets appear.

That moisture saturates the crust. From the bread's own humidity, trapped in the plastic bag and forced back onto the surface.

 The crust turns soft, rubbery, and leathery because it's slowly being drowned from the inside.

And here's the second hit: that same trapped humidity creates the exact conditions mold needs to thrive.

This is why bread in plastic often molds faster than bread left completely uncovered. You're not protecting it. You're feeding the problem.

Why The Fridge Is A Death Sentence For Bread

This one surprised me the most.

 We've been taught that cold preserves food. And for most things, it does. But bread follows different rules.

There's a chemical process called starch retrogradation. It's what makes bread go stale. When bread cools after baking, the starch molecules slowly crystallize, pushing water out and creating that hard, dry texture we hate.

This crystallization happens fastest between 35°F and 40°F.

That's exactly your refrigerator temperature.

Studies show bread stored in the fridge stales six times faster than bread stored at room temperature. Six times. You're literally accelerating the aging process every time you put a loaf in the fridge.

The fridge does prevent mold. But at the cost of destroying the texture faster. You're trading one problem for another one.

So where does that leave us? Plastic creates mold. The fridge creates staleness. Paper and linen dry bread out within a day.

This is the trap that kept me freezing bread for three years. I thought those were my only options.

What Our Grandparents Knew That We Forgot

The solution has existed for generations. It just got lost when plastic came along: Beeswax

Beeswax-coated cloth is what our grandparents used. What every farm wife during the Depression knew. What families who couldn't afford to waste a single slice of bread figured out because they had to.

It creates something plastic and paper can't: a semi-breathable barrier.

It lets moisture escape slowly, at roughly the same rate bread naturally releases it. Not too fast (like linen). Not trapped completely (like plastic). Just enough to maintain balance.

The crust can breathe, so it stays crisp. The crumb retains enough moisture to stay soft. And without the humid greenhouse effect, mold spores can't take hold.

Then plastic came along. It was cheap. It was convenient. And America adopted it without ever learning why the old methods worked.

So either freeze it or invest in the beeswax envelopes that are effective and relatively inexpensive.

HEALTHIEST BREADS TO BUY

 

Best Overall: Dave’s Killer Bread 21 Whole Grains and Seeds

Best Sprouted: Food for Life Ezekiel 4:9 Sprouted Whole Grain Bread

Best Sourdough: Bread Alone Whole Wheat Sourdough

Best Whole Wheat: Arnold 100% Whole Wheat Bread

Best Omega-3: Silver Hills Flax Omegamazing Bread

Best High Protein: Equii Classic Wheat

Best Gluten Free: Little Northern Bakehouse Gluten Free Seed & Grains

Best Whole Grain: One Mighty Mill Mighty Whole Wheat Bread

Best Low-Sodium: Canyon Bakehouse Gluten Free Ancient Grain Bread

Best Pita: Joseph’s Pita Bread   

Locally, there are many fine bakeries to get bread from. The Sanitary in Nanticoke, for me will always be the gold standard. But area super markets have been very good sources. Both Wegmans and Price Chopper have great, innovative items that are the LuLac favorites. Then there is Lackawanna County that is filled with trhe same grocery options as well as National Bakery and Best Bread out of Clarks Summit.