Right, but that is because it essentially was a necessity. Its fortification also aided in the developmental health of generations of children. Snark about it all you like; it was valuable.

People in fact don't eat dull white sliced bread in anything like the quantity they did. The majority of bread sold might be like that but we just eat less bread full stop.

But first, when you say "this godawful bread", what exactly do you mean? Chorleywood is a process, not an outcome. It's not just the template pre-sliced white/wholemeal/brown loaf thing from the three big brands. Quite a lot of bread you might think is not Chorleywood essentially is.

Go to even a larger French supermarket and buy a baguette, and that will very likely be a Chorleywood-based process. Much in-store-bakery bread is a modified Chorleywood process (if it is not, it is another similarly "ultra-processed" method, apparently called Activated Dough Development).

Most supermarket "sourdough type" bread, even some quite expensive stuff, is a modified Chorleywood process. Most ciabatta are.

I don't really eat "cut loaf" bread anymore for quite immediate health reasons — it invariably causes acid reflux and then skin irritation, so I gave it up a long time back. But I do still eat the odd part-baked bread roll and even some of those are Chorleywood process.

There is a good chance that if you're in a posh café you're still eating a Chorleywood-type bread. Because it is a way of making bread at scale; it is not a single product outcome.

> Most supermarket "sourdough type" bread, even some quite expensive stuff, is a modified Chorleywood process. Most ciabatta are.

I assume this is one reason why most supermarket "sourdough type" bread is, well, not good. (Sure, it's better than the cheapo sliced-white stuff. There's a lot of space between that and actually-good.)

I don't claim to know for sure that no bread made with Chorleywood-type processes is good. I am fairly sure, though, that no bread I've had that I have good reason to suspect was made that way has ever been much good.

(One specific complaint: It tends to have crumb that lacks elasticity. If you try to spread anything fairly thick on it -- soft cheese, say -- it tears and crumbles.If I do the same thing with one of my own loaves, the crumb flexes but doesn't tear or disintegrate. This isn't the only thing I find unsatisfactory about even supposedly fancy supermarket bread, but it's a thing I can describe fairly explicitly rather than just waving my hands and saying "well, it's just not good, you know?".)