Breaking Bread: How Food Brings Us Together
For at least 14,000 years,* humans have been baking bread. A recent archeological dig in Jordan revealed that our early ancestors appeared to make a kind of flatbread from barley, wheat, oats, and the roots of a flowering plant called club-rush tubers. We were indeed bakers before we were farmers and hunters!
This means that despite the popular notion of the pre-historic meat-eating man, our earliest ancestors were probably nibbling on crackers. 😉 Bread’s universality lies in its simplicity. With just a few ingredients you get a vast assortment of shapes, sizes, textures, and flavors: pita, naan, taboon, challah, balep, kolach, baguette, and tortillas, to name a few. Despite their differences in appearance, they’re all made from the same ingredients: water, flour, salt, and time.
Bread links us across culture, geography, religion, and time. For some, it’s a sacred sacrament; for others, it’s a national fixture worthy of a UNESCO cultural heritage list. Perhaps for these reasons, it’s been said that to break bread with one’s enemy is the fastest way to find common ground. Research shows breaking bread can foster trust and camaraderie, reduce perceptions of inequality, and make people feel more closely connected.
For those with food allergies or intolerances, however, this very thing that brings us together can also set us apart, especially in places where allergies or intolerances are poorly understood. In some churches, for example, communion can present challenges for the gluten-intolerant. At a food allergy conference years back, one mother shared with me a story about how her gluten-intolerant daughter was ostracized from their church because she wasn’t able to accept communion. She would develop rashes and headaches each time she ate the wafers (leading some members to believe the girl was possessed!).
In school cafeterias, kids are bullied for their food allergies. Traveling abroad presents its own host of challenges and risks for the food allergic/intolerant: language barriers, access to healthcare, and safe accommodations, to name a few. Indeed, trying to break bread in some countries while navigating a food allergy can have the opposite effect, as declining food in some settings can be perceived as a major cultural slight.
My experiences sharing meals with strangers have shaped how I see the world and have instilled in me an appreciation for the unifying role food plays across culture and race. I’ve broken bread with Bedouins in the Sahara, farmers in Peru, artisans in Marrakech, and fellow travelers and locals across Asia and Europe. It was in part these experiences that inspired Amulet and shaped it into the company it is today. And while I fortunately didn’t have a major allergic reaction during my international travels—although there were several close calls—having an Amulet would have provided ample comfort on those trips. One thing became increasingly clear throughout my travels and conversations with these new-found friends: the more we know, the less we fear. This belief is built into our company’s DNA and strikes at the core of what we do.
This holiday season, the Amulet team and I would love nothing more than to give you the gift of safe dining with loved ones or strangers—wherever you are in the world. Many of you are eagerly waiting to either receive your Amulet or order one—please know we see you and hear you! We’re working diligently to get our Amulets into your hands as soon as possible.
We appreciate you hanging in there and wish you all a safe, happy, and nourishing holiday season.
— Abi Barnes, Co-Founder and CEO
*Archaeologists discovered mill stones 30,000 years ago suggesting unleavened bread dates back even further.