A baguette is a long, thin loaf of bread commonly served with a simple spread or butter.
Baguette translates roughly to "wand" or "baton."
Originally, a classic French loaf was round, with a flavorful crust and a thick and heavy interior. As more and more customers began preferring the crust to the interior, the bread was stretched into the oblong shape it is today.
The rich and tender brioche is light, fluffy and crumbly because of its high content of butter and eggs.
This bread is centuries old and so rich that it's delicious served plain with butter, but it is even better when made into desserts such as bread pudding or pain au chocolat. It's also sometimes used as a base for delicate and buttery foie gras.
Ciabatta is white bread made from wheat flour, salt, yeast and water. It's distinguishable due to its airy inside and crisp outside, which is similar to French baguettes.
This bread is often served alongside olive oil and its fluffy interior soaks the oil right up.
It's a relatively new type of bread -- it wascreated in 1982 and didn't take off in commercial markets until the 1990s.
Unlike most types of bread, cornbread is not made from yeast. Instead, it is heavy with cornmeal and relies on baking powder to leaven or ferment and rise.
Naan is a leavened, baked flatbread native to South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East.
It's a staple of Indian cuisine and served in a variety of flavors with various curries, spices and fillings, but is commonly served hot and brushed with butter.
Soft pretzels are a type of baked bread traditionally twisted into a knot-like shape and sprinkled with salt.
This type of bread has been around for centuries and, along with the classic twisted shape, has variations including pretzel buns, pretzel nuggets andpretzel dogs.
The classic pretzel has many ways it can be served, with various toppings and seasonings, dipping sauces and can even be used for sandwiches.
Pumpernickel is a heavy, dark and sweet type of rye bread that originated in present-day Germany.
There are many stories of how this bread got its name, with one folklore tale attributing it to a French man who declared the coarse bread wasfit only for his horse, Nicol -- "C'est du pain pour Nicol." Though amusing, the story is just a tall tale, but the real way the bread got its name is equally silly.
"Pumpernickel" had a few other meanings in the German language, including "devil's fart."
The bread began being known as pumpernickel after it was served to German soldiers during the Thirty Years War and they would suffer indigestion from this "peasant bread."
Rye bread was popular throughout Europe during the Middle Ages.
It can be made into many different variations, including flat rye breads, multigrain bread with caraway seeds mixed in or German pumpernickel, and it can be served many different ways in all meals.
The breads range in taste, texture and even color, depending on other ingredients added to the recipe.
To be classified as rye bread, the dough must be made at least partially with rye flour.
Sourdough bread is an ancient type of bread -- it is even older than metal. The oldest loaf of sourdough found was in Switzerland anddates back to around 3500 B.C., but it's thought that the Ancient Egyptians also practiced making this bread.
Sourdough is made by slowly fermenting the dough naturally with bacteria and yeast, and has a mild sour taste.
Commonly referred to simply as "sandwich bread," white bread is most often found as loaves lining the aisles of your local supermarket. It's a light bread made with wheat flour from which the bran and germ layers have been removed.
Whole wheat bread is a type of brown bread made from flour that is milled partially or entirely from whole wheat grains.
Traditionally, the wealthy ate white bread while the poor ate brown bread, but this ideal was reversed in the 20th century when whole grain bread was discovered to have a greaternutritional value, including being a good source of fiber, iron and magnesium.