Rewena bread Rewena bread Rēwena parāoa (literally, "leavened bread," also spelled rewana) is a traditional Māori sourdough potato bread. Rēwena means both "bread made with potato yeast" and "the process of fermentation that causes bread to rise." The Maori word for potato, 'riwai' (sometimes spelled 'rewa'), is the root word of rēwena. Rēwena bread uses a pre-ferment starter, also called a ‘bug.’ It is created by boiling and mashing potatoes, then adding flour and sugar. Kumara, or sweet potatoes, may also be used. The mixture is then allowed to ferment from one to several days, depending on the ambient temperature and humidity.
Finnish bread traditional in Finland, and it makes the best of the humidity preserving qualities of traditional rye bread by serving each piece of bread as a pre-cut pair of two halves, which protect each other but can still be easily separated. The brand is not without competitors. Two of them are Fazer's "Ruispuikulat" (a newer competitor), which are oblong in shape instead, and Oululainen's "Reissumies" (preceding Vaasa's formulation by about a decade), which are round. Both competitors are distinctly more traditional in formulation than Ruispala, mainly changing the size and shape of the traditional rye bread. As rye bread is the