patrick001/Shutterstock
ByRyan Cashman/
Spain seems to be on a winning streak when it comes to expensive food products. Not only is Spain the home of the world's most expensive ham, the jamón ibérico, the Iberian nation now boasts the title of home of the world's most expensive bread. How expensive is this bread? Although the loaf of bread from your local supermarket likely didn't set you back much further than $5 in total, this particular Spanish bread is in an entirely different league. According to Money, Inc., this bread costs $120.73 per average loaf.
Notably, the keyword in that prior sentence is average.Not to be outdone, even by itself, in March of 2021 it was reported in the Madrid Metropolitan that another loaf of this same bread sold for $2,000! What would possess someone to pay that much for a single loaf of bread? Most likely, to say that they did. We'll get into what exactly makes this particular bread so expensive later, but before we do we need to enter the mind of its creator.
Juan Manuel Moreno manages the bakery Pan Pina in the village of Algatocínin the southern Spanish region of Andalusia. He developed this bread when he heard that the world's most expensive coffee was being sold in a neighboring village. He took advantage of his bakery's proximity to the wealthy getaway of Costa del Sol. In the time since he came up with the idea, the bread has become a hit with rich vacationers, likely because of the allure of its star ingredient: gold.
The gold standard for bread
LD Media UK/Shutterstock
Stop rubbing your eyes, you read that correctly. Gold, 250 milligrams to be exact, is the key ingredient in the world's most expensive bread (via Daily Mail). Although we're still not sure that we'd jump to eat the precious metal, it certainly makes the outrageous cost of the perishable slightly more understandable.
Interestingly, there are actually a number of variations of this bread. The least expensive version of this most expensive of loaves of bread is a simple, high-quality sourdough with gold dust mixed in. This is the one that costs $120 per loaf. Yes, that's right, if you spend approximately $115 more than actually needed, you can have the fine pleasure of telling your friends that even your sliced bread is rich. However, for some people, even that is not quite elegant enough. The variation that can quickly run a tab up to $2,000 is a little more complex.
According to the Madrid Metropolitan, the characteristics of this bread are the three different formats of gold and silver: dust, flakes, and leaf on the exterior to provide a 3D appearance. The interior malt creates a decorative design that looks more like fancy wallpaper than bread. Combined with the high-quality flour, this 100% handmade bread is a luxury few of us will ever get to experience.
But perhaps that is the point. Far from being a snob, Moreno has used his business savvy to create a desirable bread that appeals to the wealthiest among us who just so happen to be vacationing on the coast of Spain.Considering Pan Pina is still in business, we'd say it's a strategy that is working well.
Recommended
