Our ethos

This is a wrapped or sliced industrially produced loaf made in a factory or a supermarket in-store bakery and accounts for 97% of bread currently eaten in the UK. These are just some of the other things you might find in an industrial loaf:

E481 (sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate); E472e (mono- and diacetyl tartaric acid esters of mono- and diglycerides of fatty acids); E920 (l-cysteine); E282 (calcium propionate); E220 (potassium sorbate); E300 (ascorbic acid); E260 (acetic acid); soya flour; vegetable fat; dextrose.

What‘s more, its production also could have substances including phospholipase, fungal alpha amylase, transglutaminase, xylanase, maltogenic amylase, hemicellulose, oxidase, peptidase and protease. But if the manufacturer deems these to be processing aids, it does not have to declare them on the label. It’s hardly surprising that people find industrially produced stuff hard to digest!

Michael Pollen, food author and Professor of Journalism at University of California in Berkeley says one of his rules to distinguish real foods is to “avoid food products containing ingredients that no ordinary human would keep in the pantry”. 

Real Bread is made with simple, natural ingredients, proven over many centuries to be a beneficial part of the human diet. Money spent with local independent bakeries provides a real boost to local economies and can bring traditional skills to members of local communities as well as creating a place of social interaction for local people.

99% of UK households buy bread and 74% of us eat it at least once a day but unfortunately most of the 12 million loaves produced daily are transported around the country which can’t be good for the environment. A neighbourhood baker reduces food miles by producing Real Bread close to or even at the point of sale, especially if using flour milled from locally-grown grain.