Free Real Bread workshop to mark Lessons in Loaf success

To celebrate flying past its target of children in 100 schools learning to bake Real Bread, the Real Bread Campaign is offering free places in a central London workshop on 15 January 2013 to inspire twelve more teachers to do the same.

Real Bread Campaign coordinator Chris Young said: ‘We’ve smashed our target but why stop there? We want to see every school in Britain teaching cooking skills and every kid asking questions about the food they eat and learning to bake Real Bread!'

Since September 2009, the Campaign’s Lessons in Loaf and Bake Your Lawn schemes have helped local, independent Real Bread bakers, traditional millers, teachers and chefs to share Real Bread making skills with more than 7500 children in at least 110 schools around Britain.

‘And as we’ve had more than a thousand downloads of our teachers’ guides, it’s probably a lot more than that,’ added Chris.

The scheme’s champion loafers include the Academy for Culinary Arts’ Chefs Adopt a School team, which has taught Real Bread making at more than twenty schools, and Paul Barker of Cinnamon Square, who has worked with at least twelve.

Hosted by Sainsbury's test kitchen, participants in the 15 January workshop will learn how to make basic Real Bread dough using just flour, water, fresh yeast and a little salt. Teachers can find the workshop details, conditions and application form, to be returned by 14 December at the latest, on the schools’ page of realbreadcampaign.org at http://bit.ly/n8eVac

Part of the charity Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming, and funded by the Big Lottery’s Local Food programme, Sheepdrove Trust, membership fees and public donations, the Real Bread Campaign is helping to bring Real Bread back to the hearts of our local communities.  With membership open to everyone who cares about the state of bread in Britain, the Campaign defines Real Bread as made without the use of processing aids or any other artificial additives.  From this simple starting point, the Campaign seeks, finds and shares ways to make bread better for us, better for our communities and better for the planet.

ENDS

For more information please contact Chris Young: chris [at] sustainweb.org or 0203 5596 777
www.realbreadcampaign.org       twitter.com/realbread     facebook.com/realbreadcampaign

Notes

Current key initiatives

• The Real Bread Loaf Mark: helping bakers to show, and shoppers to see, ‘this is Real Bread!’
• The Real Bread Finder:  the only online directory dedicated to helping people find where to buy Real Bread locally. Free for bakers to add, and people to search for, local places to buy Real Bread.
• Lessons in Loaf: A guide for teachers on planning hands-on Real Bread making sessions for any age, plus lesson plans to tie the topic of bread in with a range of curriculum subjects at Key Stage 2.

• Real Bread on The Menu: the Campaign’s scheme encouraging more public sector institutions (including schools, care homes and hospitals) and food access projects (e.g. co-operative buying groups, community cafes, box schemes) around Britain to offer Real Bread.
• Knead to Know: the Real Bread starter: the guide to starting a Real Bread enterprise for your local community.
• Membership: the Campaign’s mutually-supportive national network helps bakers and everyone else who cares about the state of bread in Britain to connect with each other to ask for and share ideas and information to help the rise of Real Bread. Membership fees, at four accessible levels from individuals to large companies, help to fund the Campaign’s work.

Future plans

From July 2013, the Campaign will concentrate on helping people to take advantage of the employment, therapeutic, and social opportunities that making Real Bread by hand offers. Activities will include working with social enterprises and other organisations that support people who find themselves marginalised by mainstream society due to factors including disability, injury, mental health issues and low income.

The Campaign will also continue to support Community Supported Bakeries, microbakeries and other small, local independent enterprises and fight for the rise of Real Bread in Britain.

More details of our plans and the funding and other help we need can be found at: http://bit.ly/NVGPoi

Our funders

Local Food has been developed by a consortium of 15 national environmental organisations, and is managed on their behalf by the Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts (RSWT). Supported by the Big Lottery Fund's Changing Spaces programme, Local Food has distributed grants to a variety of food related projects to make locally grown food more accessible. www.localfoodgrants.org

The Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts (RSWT) is a registered charity, incorporated by Royal Charter, to promote conservation and manage environmental programmes throughout the whole of the UK. It has established management systems for holding and distributing funds totalling more than £20 million annually to environmental projects across the UK.

The Big Lottery Fund’s Changing Spaces programme was launched in November 2005 to help communities enjoy and improve their local environments. The programme funds a range of activities from local food schemes and farmers markets, to education projects teaching people about the local environment.

The Big Lottery Fund, the largest of the National Lottery good cause distributors, has been rolling out £2 million in Lottery good cause money every 24 hours to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK. www.biglotteryfund.org.uk.

The Sheepdrove Trust also provides generous annual funding to the Campaign.