Bread in Europe They are very light, contain preservatives (e.g. ethyl alcohol) and have a very long shelf life (often more than a month). In Ireland it is traditionally held that the end of a loaf of bread (the "heel" of the loaf) is the best part of the loaf. Other stories and myths surround this piece of the bread in Irish mythology. Irish soda bread, developed to make the most of the soft wheat grown in Ireland, is unusual for a European bread in that it is a quick bread, using the reaction of buttermilk and baking soda rather than yeast to
Sodium bicarbonate salt has many related names such as baking soda, bread soda, cooking soda, and bicarbonate of soda. In colloquial usage, the names sodium bicarbonate and bicarbonate of soda are often truncated; forms such as sodium bicarb, bicarb soda, bicarbonate, and bicarb are common. The word "saleratus", from Latin "sal æratus" meaning "aerated salt", was widely used in the 19th century for both sodium bicarbonate and potassium bicarbonate. It is known as one of the E number food additives E500. The prefix "bi" in "bicarbonate" comes from an outdated naming system and is based on the observation that twice as much