Changes

In Western societies, bread has come to symbolize the primary food that God has given us. Bread and life are intertwined as being seen as being part of each other. The utility of bread to societies in the Old and New World has evolved significantly, where different grains became important and those grains were used to form different types of breads. However, some of the important qualities of bread were likely accidental discoveries, while others still only developed much later.

==Summary==

Bread in Western societies is perhaps one of the most symbolically important foods. Given its early developed even before the rise of agriculture, and that it became the primary staple food in the Middle East and Europe as agriculture developed, demonstrates that bread has played a central role in societal change. The production of wheat, barley, and other grains developed to make breads demonstrates the variety of grain types that could be used in the bread making process. Beer became the way in which the longevity of bread could be extended, making it less costly as excess bread could then be put into beer making production. Bread has gained a sustenance symbolic link, but it was also used for medicinal purposes where early forms of penicillin developed. Bread technologies largely did not change until the 19th and 20th centuries, when automation was introduced to speed up the production of foods. One major developed was the introduction of sliced bread. More recent changes have been the creation of doughs that can rise faster by adding chemicals that catalyze the action of yeast. Despite these changes, bread has retained its centrality as a primary food for most Western societies today.

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