Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

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GJack
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Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

#1

Post by GJack » 21 Jan 2011, 18:34

I am in a play about life in the occupied Netherlands. There is a reference to a loaf of "Weißbrot" ("white bread") that was so prized that a woman would "rent" her body for it. Is that possible. I know that at least by the late 60s I found no white bread in Holland, at least as Americans know it, but only more whole meal and darker breads. Was there white bread during the Nazi Occupation?

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helitech
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Re: Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

#2

Post by helitech » 25 Jan 2011, 14:22

I can only speak for northern Germany /Baltic region / Sweden .White bread could have been a treat for birthdays or special dinners .
The dark bread was more nutritious and was standard .... nick named "Kommissbrote" army or military bread . Generally white flour was saved for cakes and pastry / cookies . Fresh baked dinner rolls " brotechen " sp" in white flour only lasted 2 days or so , perhaps that made it rare / valuable / luxury . I doubt it was a shortage to the population ..... more like a treat from the norm.
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murx
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Re: Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

#3

Post by murx » 30 Jan 2011, 11:57

Dark bread besides Kommiss-Brot also was known as "Pumpernickel" and "Panzerplatte". Black American GIs, being called "nigger" (purely historical, only in the 50s and 60s, activity does not exist anymore) called their white counterparts also "white bread". Probably the woman was sacrificing herself to get one of those.

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der bunkermann
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Re: Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

#4

Post by der bunkermann » 26 Feb 2013, 15:57

The availability of bread got down very fast after the famous ''railroad strike'' in sptember 44.
The western part of holland received very little food and resorces, even the german soldiers rations were lowered alot.
The harsch winter of 44 ( the hongerwinter) took the lives of 20.000 civillians, so a woman giving her body for a bread is no surprising thought!
People traded valuable jewelry for few kilograms of potatoes..
Gr, Tim

SonyaA
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Re: Availability of Weißbrot ("White Bread) ?"

#5

Post by SonyaA » 12 Oct 2014, 23:50

I think I recall in one of the Himmler biographies (in the context of his concerns about the diet of his men) that he feared the Germans would become like the French and prefer white bread over the traditional dark. So it must certainly have been available - and prized.

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