What is "white bread"

c.1300, as opposed to darker whole-grain type, from white (adj.) + bread (n.). Its popularity among middle-class America led to the slang adjectival sense of "conventional, bourgeois" (c.1980). Old English had hwitehlaf.

a. 1 (context chiefly US colloquial pejorative English) bland, boring; flavorless; conventional, bourgeois. 2 (context US racial slur English) Of or relating to white people, Caucasian. alt. 1 bread made from white flour. 2 (context US ethnic slur uncommon English) A white person, a person of European descent, a Caucasian; a person who 'acts white'. n. 1 bread made from white flour. 2 (context US ethnic slur uncommon English) A white person, a person of European descent, a Caucasian; a person who 'acts white'.

n. bread made with finely ground and usually bleached wheat flour [syn: light bread]

White bread typically refers to breads made from wheat flour from which the bran and the germ layers have been removed (and set aside) from the whole wheatberry as part of the flour grinding or milling process, producing a light-colored flour. This milling process can give white flour a longer shelf life by removing the natural oils from the whole grain. Removing the oil allows products made with the flour, like white bread, to be stored for longer periods of time avoiding potential rancidity.

The flour used in white breads may be bleached—that is, lightened further—by the use of chemicals such as potassium bromate, azodicarbonamide, or chlorine dioxide gas to remove any slight, natural yellow shade and make its baking properties more predictable. Some flour bleaching agents are banned from use in some countries.

In the United States, consumers sometimes refer to white bread as sandwich bread and sandwich loaf.