By Sally Prosser

Bread has significant importance in Europe. Different countries have their own individual food cultures and demonstrate this in a variety of ways. Freshly baked baguettes bought from local bakeries still hold a strong position as a daily staple in France; bread is eaten with almost every meal in Italy and celebratory loaves are baked for notable religious occasions; there are 3,200 officially recognised types of bread in Germany and its bread culture was officially added to UNESCO’s Cultural Heritage list. There are many more across the continent showing how important the role of bread is - the staff of life.

This reverence for bread has not been the replicated in the UK for more than half a century. The catalyst was when the UK government collaborated with the baking sector to create the British Baking Industries Research Association (BBIRA) in Hertfordshire. This was a partnership meant to strengthen and protect both the British baking industry and British wheat farmers.  The main focus was to repair the damage to living standards inflicted by WWII.  In 1961, the Chorleywood Bread Process (CBP) was born and promoted as an effective solution.  It was a new way, through the use of additives, to make bread quickly and in bulk, accelerating the fermentation time and enabling the use of low-protein wheat to make it cheap.  Today over 80% of bread in the UK is made by industrialised methods - primarily sliced and wrapped in plastic.

However, in recent years there has been a change in attitude to this fluffy, soft, additive-laden product by many consumers in the UK who are looking for a more traditional alternative. Sourdough in particular, which uses natural yeasts, better quality flour and longer fermentation times, is seeing a renaissance. This interest was accelerated during the COVID pandemic where people were confined to their homes and started experimenting with sourdough.  They were able to dedicate the time and attention required to make this type of bread that harks back to a less frenetic era. People began developing their own starters and discovering a very different end result to mass-produced baked offerings. The sourdough slow fermenting process produces a much stronger flavoured bread that is very robust in texture. It’s more satisfying so you eat less of it. Many nutritionist studies suggest that it has a higher nutritional value and prebiotic benefits too, contributing to a healthier diet.

This kick-started an epiphany in the tastes of a large segment of the bread-buying customer base, with parallels to the revolution in coffee drinking in the 1990s. Consumers are better informed about how bread is made, the source of the ingredients, the vast difference in flavour and texture from the ubiquitous sliced loaf. The growing concern about empty calories means the nutritional and health benefits are high priority too. Also akin to the shift to quality coffee, the price they are prepared to pay for a loaf of bread has risen dramatically.  The number of small bakeries using hand-crafted methods has increased and, according to a report by The Open University Business School, the estimated retail value categorised as ‘artisanal’ rose from 600 million in 2005 to 700 million in 2015 (versus an overall decline in packaged bread sales).  Specialist, high-end bakers have popped up on the high street. While small chains like Gails have been successful in London for several years, independent, local business such as The Winchester Bakery are thriving in the provinces.

Food retail in the UK is dominated by ‘the big four’ supermarkets and they have responded to this trend by developing their own products to gain a share of this relatively small but lucrative, growing market. It has spawned the introduction of ‘sourdough’ loaves on the shelves of Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, Asda and Lidl. Higher-end chains Marks and Spencer and Waitrose sell ‘sourdough’ from their in-house bakeries. They also stock mass-produced brands such as Jason’s and Bertinet that have launched in the last couple of years. These bread products are more convenient for customers to access and often retail at considerably less than the price charged by small, independent businesses.

There is no legal definition of ‘sourdough’ in the UK or industry standard of what constitutes a genuine version of this bread-making process. Small bakers are under pressure by this blurring of the lines meaning they have to explain how their added-value leads to a higher price. These factors include the difference in time needed to hand-make and slow prove their loaves, quality of ingredients and expertise, a more sustainable approach (less packaging and food miles for instance) as well as their positive role in the local community.

The Real Bread Campaign, part of Sustain - an alliance of communities and organisations working together to improve food systems and practices - is behind their cause. It’s pressing for a less opaque standard across the whole industry and championing genuine sourdough which they define as using only natural, quality ingredients and traditional baking methods.

Currently three methods are described as ‘sourdough’ for products on the supermarket shelves. There’s the traditional way of using a completely natural sourdough levain or starter made with just flour, water and salt. This method is used by the majority of artisanal bakers. Also available is bread made using a natural starter plus the addition of baker’s yeast. Industrial manufacturers may also, controversially, add dried sourdough to products. This shortens the fermentation time significantly, and is labelled as made ‘with sourdough’.

“We’re seeing more and more ‘sourfaux’, which is what we call products named or marketed using the word sourdough but that are in fact manufactured using additives and other unnecessary extras that have no place in genuine sourdough bread,” says Chris Young of The Real Bread Campaign. “The use of baker’s yeast, for example, speeds the process, reducing the time that lactic acid bacteria have to cause potentially beneficial changes to the dough.”

Anomarel Ogen, who works with Gail’s and Bertinet Bakery agrees “We fundamentally believe that everyone deserves better bread by keeping it simple with only natural, quality ingredients, and using traditional sourdough baking methods – including an optimum fermentation process designed to enhance flavour and nutrition,” he says.

In response to this, and part of the creation of UK food standards necessitated by Brexit, the UK Government and devolved administrations are running a public consultation on proposals to update and amend The Bread and Flour Regulations 1998.

However, at this point, the consultation doesn’t include any of the Real Bread Campaign’s proposals which is also supported by more than 150 bakery owners and workers who signed a letter to Defra, and by more than 1000 people who wrote to their MPs.

The absence of meaningful regulation, the soaring costs of energy, property rents, raw materials (such as wheat prices impacted by the war in Ukraine), the shortage of skilled bakery workers and the pressure on the disposable income of consumers due to the UK recession is the situation faced by small bakeries right now. Will the transition from industrialised, cheap, low-standard products to hand-made, artisanal bread using natural ingredients and methods continue?

A recent survey carried out by Opinium* on behalf of The Bertinet Bakery, in association with the Real Bread Campaign, found a real shift in British consumers attitude to bread:

• 61% said they’re not totally confident of what goes into most supermarket loaves.

• 66% said they would prefer to eat loaves with as few preservatives and other additives as possible.

• 60% said they would like to see more natural options in the supermarket.

• 47% said that finding a loaf contained palm oil and additives would put them off eating it.

This indicates that while there may be some challenges ahead for the craft baking industry in the short term, there has been a considerable change in the importance of quality bread in British food culture that is here to stay.  It seems that finally the UK public know on which side their bread is buttered.