Before I get into this somewhat touchy subject, let me say first and foremost that bread is made to be eaten. You're best bet is to buy what you're going to eat in a day or two and then come back for more when you're done. If you want to keep a loaf of Zingerman's bread for more than a few days, your best bet is to freeze it.
When you consider which bread to buy remember that loaves with a higher ratio of crust to crumb - i.e., baguettes or other long thin loaves - will always have a shorter shelf life, and a tendency to dry out more quickly. They've got more surface area and less "middle". I wouldn't recommend a baguette or a long Farm Bread if you want a bread that will last a few days.
So, with that preface out of the way, here's my recommendations for the care and handling of a loaf of Zingerman's bread.
1. Please don't put it in plastic.
OK, I know that I'm straying from the all-American party line on this one. But it is my very, very firm belief that good bread keeps best when it is not stored in plastic. I know, I know, in this country, we've been taught to store just about everything in plastic. But when it comes to good bread, I'm telling you, plastic, more often than not, is the enemy.
What's wrong with bread in plastic? Well...everything. Real bread needs to breathe. And sealed in a plastic bag, bread breathes about as well as you or I would if we were sealed in plastic. In other words, it doesn't. While the bread continues to exhale, it can't inhale. Moisture is trapped in the bag. Moisture which will turn even the crispest crust soft. Soggy, like a bowl of Corn Flakes and milk left on the table for an hour. Soggy with a capital S. See crust is meant to protect the bread. Just like the rind on a natural cheese, real bread has very real crust to protect the inside of the loaf from drying out. But when it's been sealed in plastic the crust is losing it's magic, losing it's texture. And the bread is losing its life. Slowly, it is dying.
Moisture also creates an environment in which bread is prone to molding. Good bread, stored in a paper bag so that it can breathe, will never mold.
I don't mean to be melodramatic here. But if you're going to go to the trouble of buying good bread, why suffocate it?
2. Keep it on the Counter
So what should you do with your Zingerman's bread? Well, what I do with it, is leave it on the counter. I just turn the cut side down to the counter top, or at most put the bread into a paper or wax bag. Bread boxes (remember those?) work well too, except that I don't have one. The key here is NO plastic.
Doesn't the bread dry out a little when you leave it exposed?. Yeah, a little. But just a little. Because Zingerman's breads are made with so much less yeast than most, you'll find that they hold up much, much longer in their natural state.
Now, I'm not saying that your loaf will be exactly the same after three days of sitting on your counter as it was on the day you took it home. Bread made without the addition of preservatives is going to get drier as it ages. Certainly, the crust gets harder. But that's what crust is there for. To protect the bread. Yes, the exposed surface of the bread gets dry. Again, that's the bread protecting itself naturally. But just inside that exposed surface, you'll find that the bread itself is fine. Still pretty soft, just as flavorful as ever. Again, don't be fooled by the hardness of the crust. I've kept loaves of raisin pecan bread unwrapped for a week. The crust feels hard as a rock. But when I slice into the loaf, it's still moist, and chewy and ... great to eat. Really.
3. Don't put in the refrigerator.
The only thing worse than putting bread in plastic is putting it in plastic first and then putting it in the refrigerator. Everything that's bad about plastic in the first place is still true in the refrigerator. Except that the cold, moist environment of the fridge is bound to create even more moisture inside the plastic, and... well, it's just not a good place to store good bread.
4. Freezing works well!
If you want to keep a loaf of Zingerman's bread for more than a few days, your best bet is to freeze it. In fact, the only time bread and plastic ought to meet is on their way into the freezer. If you aren't planning to eat the whole loaf, cut it in half and freeze what you're not going to eat right away. Enjoy the first half, then when you're ready pull the other piece out of the freezer. If you're going to eat the frozen half right away, you can thaw it by heating it in the oven right out of the freezer. About 20-25 minutes at 350° should do it. If not, I'd just leave it to thaw on the counter. Still you'll find a quick visit to a hot oven will bring back a little of the life that made the bread so great when it went into the freezer in the first place.
5. Reheating
One of the nicest ways to enjoy a good loaf of bread is to give it a few minutes in the oven before you eat it. About 15-20 minutes at about 350° works well for me. Just enough to heat it through to the middle, and to give the crust a little added crispness. This is what we do when we double bake our rye and pumpernickel for our sandwiches. If you're not going to eat a whole loaf in one sitting, just cut off what you're going to use, and heat only that piece.
6. Back from the Dead
One of the great things about the added shelf life of Zingerman's unyeasted breads (that's the Farm Bread, the Raisin Pecan, the Sourdough) is that no matter how hard and dry they may feel after a week or more on the counter, if you brush them with a bit of warm water and throw them in the oven for fifteen or twenty minutes, they come back to life beautifully. A week, two weeks, even three, it really works. I know this sounds a bit like those old bic pen commercials where they beat the heck out of a pen and find it still works, but this is no made-for-tv simulation. I've done it myself with bread I left on the counter before going out of town for a week and a half. And sure enough, twenty minutes in a 350° F oven and you'd have thought it was a few days old at most!
7. Longer Life May Mean More Flavor
In talking about care and handling of bread it's commonly assumed that time is your enemy. Older bread is bad. "Is this fresh?" is the standard query. Well, yes it's fresh, but "fresh" isn't necessarily any more desirable in a bread than it is in your kids.
I know it's tough to overcome that hot from the oven bread tastes best myth. But I'll tell you. Better breads will actually be better a day or two after they're baked. And if you eat them just out of the oven there is something warm and sensual about it. But from a flavor standpoint, there's a lot missing. Because a good loaf of bread isn't really "done" until, hours, a day, or sometimes days after it's come out of the oven. That's right. A good bread needs time to set up. Time to allow its flavors to develop, its crust to crisp and its character to emerge. With many of Zingerman's breads - especially rye, the pumpernickel, the Farm Bread come to mind - you'll find that they actually have even more flavor a day or so after you've bought them.