Myths surrounding Bread-baking and menstruation (maybe TMI for some)

Factual Questions
1

I was hoping that I wouldn’t have to ask about this, but so far my research has not been very helpful. I have searched both the Straight Dope archives and SDMBs to no avail. Have also searched the Internet repeatedly and asked some of the women in my family about this and have gotten no help.

I recently heard something at work that sounds like a very silly superstition. Two of my coworkers were discussing holiday baking, when one claimed that she’d ‘learned the hard way’ not to try to make bread during her period. The other coworker agreed, explaining that it “deactivates the yeast”. I have never heard anything so silly in my life and said so - inadvertently offending the first coworker who proceeded to tell me (at length) about how, years earlier when she was menstruating, she’d tried to make several loaves of bread and could not get them to rise.
I don’t bake, so while I know that yeast makes bread rise (something to do with sugar), that’s about all I know. I have asked my Mom and Aunts, and, not only does not-baking run in my family, but they weren’t even familiar with the belief that bread-baking and periods don’t mix!

So my questions are:

  1. Has anyone else heard of this?

  2. Is there any truth to it? (sounds like nonsense to me, but I could be wrong)

  3. What’s the mechanism if somehow menstruation does “deactivate” yeast? Would it be associated with not washing your hands after using the restroom?

  4. Since bacteria and yeast keep a natural balance in the vagina, do they also keep one in bread? Could the real culprit of the non-rising dough be vaginal bacterial overgrowth (yes, it’s gross - see handwashing question above)

  5. If not menstruation or bacteria, then what could have nixed the bread?

I realize I should just put the issue aside, never eat anything either of my two coworkers bring to a potluck, keep buying bread at the grocery in blissful ignorance, and drink heavily until I can no longer even remember this icky conversation occurred. But like a dog with an old sock, I just can’t let it go. Any feedback that would enlighten me and/or put my worried mind to rest would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

2

Vaginal Antimycogenic Vapors.

Seriously.

Actually… not seriously. I’m making it up, because I think “vaginal antimycogenic vapors” would make an excellent name for a rock band.

3

1. Has anyone else heard of this?

There have been cultural prohibitions against menstruating women doing certain things as long as there have been menstruating women and culture. I’ve heard similar things–there’s a lot of stuff like that in the Old Testament, for example, where menstruating women were ritually unclean during their periods.

2. Is there any truth to it?

No, there isn’t. Think about it–how could there be? Yeast is a single-celled organism that responds to warmth and food by growing and reproducing. It has an optimal temperature range, like all living organisms. If the water is too hot, it kills the yeast cells. If it’s too cold, the cells can’t grow, they just sit there.

You can slow yeast down by cooling it off, taking away its food (which is sugar and/or flour), changing the water’s pH radically (yeast is happiest at “neutral”), or adding salt, which slows down its growth (it didn’t evolve to use salt water, it evolved to use fresh water, so adding too much salt throws a biochemical monkey wrench into its growth machinery).

But how could the state of the baker’s ovaries, uterus, or vagina have anything to do with the growth conditions for yeast in the bowl on the table? If that were true, then after 10,000 years of agriculture and bread-baking, humans would have learned by now that women who are on their periods can’t bake bread, and you’d have nothing but men making all the cinnamon rolls down at Kroger’s baked goods department, since Kroger can’t afford to hire female bakers who can only work three weeks a month.

Or else they’d hire nobody but post-menopausal women. Or women who were certified as having had hysterectomies.

**3a. What’s the mechanism if somehow menstruation does “deactivate” yeast? **

It’s possible that your skin’s pH changes during menstruation, but in order for the pH of your hands to change the pH of the bread dough enough to influence the yeast, your skin’s pH would have to be, like, WAYYY off the scale, we’re talking science fiction aliens with bubbling sulfuric acid skin or something here.

Ditto for “salt on your hands”. You’d have to have skin like the Great Alkali Desert to change the bread dough.

**3b. Would it be associated with not washing your hands after using the restroom?
4. Since bacteria and yeast keep a natural balance in the vagina, do they also keep one in bread? **

No, because the yeast in bread dough and the yeast in your vaginal yeast infection are different kinds of yeast.

http://www.wholehealthmd.com/print/view/1,1560,RA_548_learn,00.html

Vaginal infection yeast is candida. There are about 160 kinds of yeast used in bread. Candida is not one of them. The most common kind of breast yeast, baker’s yeast, is Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

http://www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/bread/activity-yeast.html

4b. Could the real culprit of the non-rising dough be vaginal bacterial overgrowth (yes, it’s gross - see handwashing question above?

Unless you’re the sort of person who rams her hand into her vagina while she’s in the bathroom, swirls it around in there to get it nice and sticky, and then runs directly to the kitchen to deposit the goop in the bread dough, I don’t see how vaginal bacteria could affect the bread dough. The few bacteria your hand picks up from wiping yourself after you go to the bathroom and then not washing your hands wouldn’t affect the yeast–all kitchens are full of bacteria anyway, unless you’re cooking in some Procter & Gamble test kitchen.

5. If not menstruation or bacteria, then what could have nixed the bread?

Inattention. That’s all.

If her bread didn’t rise at all, then what happened was that (a) her yeast was expired, or (b) she had the water either too hot, which killed the yeast, or too cold, which prevented it from springing to life. Both these things are caused by “not paying attention”–to the date on the packet, or to the temperature of the water coming out of the faucet.

And it happens to all of us at some point in our bread-baking careers, only we don’t always have the convenient excuse of “I was on my period” to blame it on…

4

Har. “Bread yeast”.

5

Unless the person in question is kneading the bread with her vagina, I think it most likely that there is some other explanation for the non-rising loaves; my suggestions would be (and forgive me if I stray beyond mere idle speculation, through broad generalisations and deep into stereotypes, but I do need to assume that it is at least possible that an altered state of mind sometimes accompanies menstruation):

  • She forgot to add the yeast (seriously, this really is a common mistake when making bread)
  • She didn’t knead it for long enough.
  • She didn’t allow it long enough to prove.
  • (really long shot) Her slightly elevated body temperature caused her to misjudge the temperature of the water, or the temperature of the place in which the proving was done.

or

  • Coincidence (some random problem with the ingredients or methods)

I’ve heard things similar to this before (A friend of mine claimed that female chefs are not allowed to touch pork while they are menstruating. I don’t know whether this is true, but if it is, it is most likely based on frightened ignorance (and here we all were thinking women were supposed to be the hysterical ones), rather than any fact or empirical observation.

6

Well, just for the helluvit:
Is yeast infection yeast the same as cooking yeast?

7

Yeast is yeast and bread is dough, and never the twain shall meet.

:smiley:

8

If that’s the case, I’m sending my bride-to-be over for some lessons.

Seriously, now, I suspect the origin of this myth might originate in the observed tendency for vaginal yeast infections to clear up during menses, due to the changes in the vaginal environment making it less hospitable to Candida, and the confusion between it and Saccharomyces.

9

I used to back all my own bread, plus some for friends and neighbors, up to 12 loaves a week. I did this every week for over two years. If you stop and think about it, clearly I was menstruating for at least some of those cooking sessions. I never noticed it making a difference.

Now, for most women we don’t feel our best the first day or so of our period. It’s not that we can’t do stuff*, it’s more like our enthusiasm isn’t all there. For some unfortunate women, their period is not just an annoyance, it is a genuinely painful and distracting experience. I could see such a woman being so distracted that she is more likely to screw up in the bread-making process.

Also keep in mind that, in many cultures, women do not get days off EXCEPT during “that time of the month”. So five days of being regarded as “unclean” might not be so bad if she can catch up on her sleep, get a break from constant chores, and so forth. And I’m sure that contributes somewhat to these myths.

Among others I’ve heard - women should not brew beer at “that time”, or can food, or spin yarn, or dye yarn, or cook, or clean, or touch a man, or touch a man’s clothes or bed or any possession of his… there’s quite a range of menstruation taboos.

  • I passed the FAA flight test for my pilot’s license while “on the rag”. About halfway through the test the Tylenol wears off, the cramps return, I’m worried about leaks and how I’m going explain THAT mark on the upholstery to a hangarful of guys - AND trying to pass “unusual attitude recovery under the hood”. This is not a good combination. But I passed. As I said, we’re still capable, just not enthusiastic.
10

But women SHOULD give up the boo-tay during menstruation!

11

Why do you think Matzoh is unleavened??
:smiley: :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

;j

Cartooniverse

12

To get to the otherside.:smiley:

13

Jesus, there’s a string of words I never thought I’d see together…lol.

14

Anecdotal: Back in the 1950s, my grandmother was a reknowned baker and caterer, and she frequently worked in the homes of a number of prominent, wealthy families. Once, when she was preparing food for a dinner party for 30+ people at one of those family’s homes, she asked the woman of the house for some aspirin. She asked “Oh, do you have a headache?” and my grandmother confided that no, she had menstrual cramps. At that, the woman immediately told Grandma not to touch any more of the food, and that she’d certainly receive the entire fee for the catering job but it was forbidden for a menstruating woman to prepare food and the family’s housekeeper had to take over the preparations mid-stream.

The woman explained it by stating that it was against Jewish law, but none of my understanding of the practice of niddah – the separation of women during menstruation and the week or so thereafter – demands that a niddah woman not cook. The only thing I haven’t been able to confirm is whether or not different rules would apply to a non-Jewish niddah woman cooking for Jews. (Can any of our Orthodox Dopers speak to that issue?) I can’t see why there’d be a difference, but there well might be.

In any case < nasty joke > I think it’s advisable for a woman to avoid kneading bread with her vagina unless she’s making dill bread. < /nasty joke >

(I’m not going to explain that one, if you get it you’ll get it, if not, don’t ask me, it’s the dirtiest joke I personally know but I’m too embarrassed to be more explicit with it.)

15

TeaElle, “Judaism” is not one, homogenous whole. There are many different groups of Jews with varying customs, and it’s not at all unusual for, say, Jews from, say, Denmark to adopt Danish customs as well as maintaining Jewish customs passed down by their ancestors.

So this interpretation could have been from either the subdivision of Judaism the woman belonged to, or the customs of where she or her recent ancestors came from.

16

Firstly - thanks to everyone for replying! My biggest fear with my first thread was that it would be ignored.

I do have to say that I thought about it possibly being a regional or cultural difference as to why i had not heard about this particular menstrual myth. I am reasonable familiar with most if not all of the wives tales in the area of rural Indiana where I grew up. The women I was talking with are from a different area of the country. So I am especially pleased to hear from those of you who grew up with this or similar folk wisdom.

I was also very very certain from the moment I heard this that it was a bunch of hoo-ha (or at the very least, scientifically unfounded), but I wanted to make sure I was not being overly critical. That’s why I had all that musing about “if it could be done - how?” As one of my Aunts said when I tried to ask her “Maybe there’s something to it. You know some of those old wives tales became wives tales for a reason.” I now feel much more confident in my original assertion.

I did check on Cecil’s column regarding bread vs vaginal yeast. (But I’ll use any excuse to reread through the old columns) :wink:

All in all it was completely worth it just for this quote:

And I thought Kegels were tough!!!

BTW, Mangetout, thanx for all the info on bread making - I had no idea it could be that difficult! I think I will stick to buying loaves at the store in blissful ignorance.

17

Good point. In thinking about this woman and some of the other things that she said/did when my grandmother was in her employ, it seems that she was the kind to use her Jewishness as an excuse for a whole plethora of things. Hmm.

18

You mean, she faked her orgasms too??

:eek:

:stuck_out_tongue:

(d&r)