Breadcrumbs archive 2013

Back issues of Breadcrumbs, the Real Bread Campaign's monthly enewsletter

NB As this is an archive, some of the infomation and links given might no longer be current or correct.

• December
• November
• October
• September
• August
• July
• June
• May
• April
• February
• January

Previous years

• 2012
• 2011
• 2010
• 2009

December

Hi,

What a great year for the Campaign 2013 has been! Highlights include:

• our January get-together at The School of Artisan Food attended by around 100 Campaign members;
• Real Bread Maker Week in May, which raised not only awareness for the rise of Real Bread but more than £2500 to help keep us going;
• reporting in June that we’d exceeded all of our targets as our Big Lottery Local Food grant came to an end;
• Grub Street publishing their edition of our book Knead to Know, which sold out in weeks and has since been reprinted;
• the first Sourdough September going global in the same month we won a Young British Foodies award;
• Campaign members more or less clearing the board at the first World Bread Awards;
• global media coverage of our therapeutic and social bread making report Rising Up;
• Real Bread standards being added to the Food For Life catering mark certification scheme in October;
• and the second Real Bread Festival in November.

Thanks to office volunteer Pete Smith (who’s moved on from deskwork after nine months to get his digits doughy) and the rest of you for all of your help in achieving all of this.

The big challenge remains securing the bread so our charity can keep on running the Campaign. I keep writing grant applications and working to promote our ever-growing supporter scheme, but I still need YOUR help.

As this is the last ‘crumbs until January, I’ll say happy Christmas and New Year!

Upper Crust

Rising Up all over the world
As well as coverage in national media here in the UK, promoting our new therapeutic and social bread making report has been featured as far afield as Australia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, The Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, and the USA. You can download the report here and find links to highlights of the coverage here. 

The C word
It’s December, so I can use it now. Two ways you can treat the loaf lovers in your life (and us) this Christmas are buying them our book Knead to Know and a gift membership of the Campaign, with all the bits and bobs that entitles them to throughout the year. Find details of our book here and read about gift membership here.

More crumbs

New Campaign member discounts
In return for our members’ support, we’re always working to secure new discounts. Thank you to the following, who are the latest to join almost fifty bready educators who offer generous discounts to our members: Saxton's Home Bakery, Lesley's Kitchen, Wychelm Bread School, Bake with Maria, Seasoned, Real Bread at Home, A Taste of the Past, Jo's Loaves and Vaughan's Kitchen. Find full details of these (and many more) classes and offers here.

Offers ending soon
On the weekend of 14 and 15 December ONLY, Bread Matters is offering Campaign members 10% off all purchases over £10 through their online shop. You also only have until the end of December to join us and receive your FREE sachet of Andrew Whitley’s sourdough starter from Bread Matters.  Click here for details of both offers.

Not a Campaign member?
If you’ve not joined us, or have received a reminder that your membership has lapsed, please click here NOW! Remember: you don’t have to be a baker to join us.

The Real Bread Book
A quick update: after more than fifty bakeries kindly donated their recipes and stories, we’ve finished writing our second book and it is now being edited. We now need to arrange recipe testing and photography. If anyone has experience of book publishing project management and can lend Chris a hand in getting our celebration of Real Bread and its bakers ready for publication, please email realbread [at] sustainweb.org

Funding update
Our ultimate goal is to make the Campaign self-funding through membership fees, donations and payments for publications. Until then, Chris continues to submit grant funding applications to enable Sustain to carry on running the Campaign, resume services including our jobs page, and to begin our proposed Together We Rise project.

Real Bread enterprise

New Real Bread Campaign postcards
We still REALLY need YOUR help finding new members, please. If you run a bread-related business, one way of doing this is to display our new promotional postcards (based on the back cover of True Loaf issue 17) in your bakery, shop, mill, baking school etc. If you’d be happy to help, please click on this link and add your details so I can get an idea of how many we need to get printed.

Don’t ditch your dough!
Sustain (the charity that runs the Real Bread Campaign) is working as part of the FoodSave project to help small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in London to reduce their food waste, and to divert unavoidable food waste to useful purposes. If you run an SME bakery in London and would like help assessing your food waste situation, preparing a tailored waste action plan, and taking the next practical steps, please contact Charlotte Jarman: charlotte [at] sustainweb.org
www.sustainweb.org/foodwaste

End Crust
Campaign member The Hornbeam Bakers’ Collective is inviting people to help crowdfund their Community Supported Bakery project in Walthamstow.

November

For once, we're sending you your 'crumbs early!

This is partly because we couldn’t wait any longer to tell you all about Rising Up, our new report on the therapeutic and social benefits of bread making, and partly so we could remind you about the Real Bread Festival this weekend.

We also have more reasons for the 6500 or so of you on our mailing list who aren’t current Campaign members to join us or renew your membership.
For these and more crumbs, please read on.

The Upper Crust

Rising Up
We have just published Rising Up, our new report on research into the therapeutic and social benefits Real Bread making offers to people living with mental health issues, or otherwise facing a tougher time than most of us. It also outlines how only a tiny fraction of the thousands of people who could benefit ever get the chance to do so.

We are still working to secure the money (including membership fees and donations) to be able to run Together We Rise, a new project designed to change this.

Real Bread Festival
The second Real Bread Festival takes place this Friday and Saturday, 1 and 2 November, at Old Spitalfields Market in London.

Real Bread guests include:  Jane Mason (Virtuous Bread / Bread Angels), Manuel Monade and Yann Legallais (Flour Power City), Vincent Talleu (Flint Owl Bakery), Andrew Whitley (Bread Matters) and Chris Young (The Real Bread Campaign). We have a stand at the event from 1100-1930 on Friday and from 1000 to early/mid-afternoon on Saturday, so please come along to say hi to Chris and whoever he manages to rope in to help out. You can find full details at: www.realbreadfestival.com

More crumbs

Not a Campaign member yet?
Then please JOIN US! In case you missed it, our main funding ended back in the summer. Sustain, the charity that runs the Campaign threw us a lifeline to allow us extra time to find new funding but without new members, there’s a chance that the Campaign will be forced to close before any comes through. If you’re not yet a member (or you’ve had a reminder that your membership has lapsed) please click here NOW!

Win £245 of Real Bread goodies and see your article in print
Campaign members only have until the end of November to pen a bready article for the chance to WIN a Christmas stocking of a Real Bread class, books and other goodies worth £245! The winning piece will also appear in our magazine True Loaf, which goes to Campaign members across the UK and in 14 other countries! For details of the competition and prizes, click here.

Wood Fired Ovens
Thank you to Amrit at Wood Fired Ovens, who very kindly is donating £25 for every oven they sell, and even more generously back dating this to the start of the year!
Plus…every Real Bread Campaign member who buys an oven from wood-firedoven.co.uk will receive a FREE copy of From The Wood Fired Oven by Richard Miscovich (Chelsea Green, 2013, RRP £32.99). Please quote your membership number when you buy.

Free Bread Matters sourdough
Thanks to Andrew Whitley, UK residents joining the Campaign (or renewing their membership) between 31 October and 31 December will receive a free sachet of Bread Matters original sourdough starter worth £4.95. Yup, this is yer actual rye culture that Andrew picked up in Kostroma on the Volga in 1990 and used to make Russian-style Real Breads at The Village Bakery and ever since!

More thanks
Thank you to those of you who have made donations in the past month to help keep us going. One particular mention to James Baird, who sent in a very generous £100 – thank you!

Gift membership
Another way you can help the Campaign, and tick people off your present buying list, is our gift membership scheme. For full details, click here.

Recommend a friend!
Please please encourage everyone you know – friends, family, customers – to join the Campaign. For now, it’s just of the glory of being named the best recommender but we’re working to sort out prizes to give away at some point down the line…

End Crust
As it’s Hallowe’en, here’s The Haxby Baker’s boogasse.

October

I’m sure you’re as busy as me, so I’ll try to continue my recent trend of keeping this as short as I can.

The headline, really, is PLEASE HELP US!

While I’m working my socks off to secure new grant funding to ensure Sustain can continue running the Real Bread Campaign, I really need your support in encouraging new members to join us as soon as possible.

For this and more crumbs, please read on.

Upper crust

Help us!
The grant that enabled our charity Sustain to run the Real Bread Campaign ended in the summer. Without new members, there’s a chance that the Campaign will be forced to close before new funding comes through. If you’re not yet a member (or you’ve had a reminder that your membership has lapsed) please JOIN US!

If you run a bakery, baking school, mill or other bread-related business and would like to display Real Bread Campaign membership promotional leaflets, please email us to say how many and the address to send them. realbread [at] sustainweb.org

Yo ho dough
As an incentive to join us, the new True Loaf offers Campaign members the chance to WIN a Christmas stocking of a Real Bread class, books and other goodies worth £245! For details of the competition and prizes, click here.

Gift membership
Another way you can help the Campaign, and tick people off your present buying list, is our gift membership scheme. For full details, click here.

More crumbs

Rising Up
Later this month we’ll publish Rising Up, our report on the therapeutic and social benefits of bread making for people living with mental health issues or otherwise having a tougher time than most of us. With a foreword by Great British Bake Off winner and depression sufferer John Whaite, the report also outlines the yawning gap between how many people could have the chance to benefit, and the small number who do.  Our proposed project, Together We Rise, aims to fill that gap sokeep an eye out for news of this new publication on The Real Baker-e, Facebook and Twitter.

Real Bread is Food for Life
We’re proud to announce that schools, hospitals and all other caterers serving Real Bread can now earn points towards silver and gold Food for Life Catering Mark certification from The Soil Association. Read more here.

World Bread Awards
Congratulations to the Real Bread Campaign members who were named either winners or runners up in all but the junior categories of the first ever World Bread Awards. For details, click here.

End crust

Silly loaf song
We have a new promotional video! To watch it and see all of the people behind it, click here.

Please share the link with everyone you know!

You can also see behind the scenes photos here.

September

In case you’ve just signed up (or have been living under a rock cake for the past six months), it’s Sourdough September!

If you’re passionate about lovely, long-fermentation loaves produced by the almost-alchemic transformation of just flour, water, salt and the myriad beneficial bacteria and yeasts that made the originals cereal grains their home, then now’s the time to share it.

And if you know nothing about this ancient art, whose long-overdue revival is at last underway, then this month is the perfect opportunity to get a taste.

And a question: you're on our mailing list but are you a current member of the Real Bread Campaign? 

The Upper Crust

Wild thing, you make my loaf spring
Great to see so many of you running Sourdough September activities out in the real world and spreading the word face to face and online. You can find details of what people are up to here and find out how you can join in here.

Online, the #sourdoughseptember hashtag is getting plenty of use on Twitter, which is where you can also join in the sourdough special edition of #breadchat from 8-9pm on Wednesday 18 September. Special guest chatters confirmed so far include Campaign ambassadors Richard Bertinet, Aidan Chapman and Andrew Whitley.

More Crumbs

Are YOU a Real Bread Campaign ambassador?

If you are a Campaign member, then the answer is YES!

Alongside our six official ambassadors, everyone who joins the Campaign has the chance to help spread the word about locally-made Real Bread and what makes it so fab. We also need your help to let people about the Campaign and why it’s needed. 

Very importantly, WE NEED YOUR HELP to encourage people to JOIN THE CAMPAIGN!

If you bake loaves for sale, then tell all of your customers and whether you’re a baker or not, tell all of your family, colleagues and friends to get along to www.realbreadcampaign.org

And if you have your own corner of the intermesh that’s not yet wearing our supporter badge with pride, then please download and pin it on today.

If you’re reading this, the chances are you’re NOT a member of the Real Bread Campaign!

The fact is, we need more members to help ensure the Campaign can continue.

Sad to say, the majority of people on our Breadcrumbs’ mailing list aren’t current members of the Real Bread Campaign, either because they haven’t renewed it or have never joined.

Annual membership starts from less than two quid a month, so c’mon, people, in return for fighting the corner for Real Bread and its makers and all of the benefits and values for which they stand, we need your support, please..

If you’re not a member, you’re missing out on the exclusive True Loaf magazine, discounts on dozens of bread making classes (and more), chances to enter prize competitions, and access to The Real Baker-e forum, to which almost 700 members now subscribe to ask for and share ideas and information.

Check if you’re a current Campaign member here by entering your email address into the ‘update code reminder’ box and then following the instructions.

August

Before I start on the news, I wanted to give a nod to all of the pro bakers amongst you who’ve been wrestling to keep dough under control in the recent heatwave. We salute you!

The focus of this month’s ‘crumbs is on Sourdough September and our new Real Bread book, both of which can ONLY happen with the help of Campaign members and supporters. There are now more than 7000 of you on our mailing list, and together we can make both FANTASTIC celebrations!

The Upper Crust

Real Bread book
Danni ends her six week sabbatical with us today and so if you’ve offered to donate one of your Real Bread recipes, please send it, your story and a high resolution photo of the loaf to her TODAY! And we’ve still got a few slots to fill – bagels, cinnamon buns, flatbreads, local specials, anyone? For more information and to sign up, click here.

If you've offered a recipe already, please send it, your story and photos to: realbread [at] sustainweb.org

Sourdough September
Mother lovers – what will YOU be doing to help Britain celebrate sourdough and demystify desem? Add details of your sourdough Real Bread tastings, workshops, competitions, and swapmeets to our calendar here.  I’m putting out a media release next week to fly the flag for feral fermentation and need YOUR plans to share! Add your leaven loving levity here.

To read more about the week and SourDOH! – our Twitter name and shame of sham #sourdough next month – click here.

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The Real Bread Festival rises again
The organisers of the first-ever Real Bread Festival last year have some exciting news –it’s back, and if you’re a professional baker, you could be part of it! The event's director, Yael Rose, has allocated ten stands at their Cheese & Wine Festival in old Spitalfields Market in London on Friday 1st and Saturday 2nd November.  Yael said 'I am still in search of the perfect location for another full-on bread festival like last year’s but in the meantime I hope you will join us for this fantastic opportunity to celebrate, shout and educate about all things Real Bread!' For details of how to apply for a stall or if you have any questions, please get in touch with Samantha Grieves at roseeventsco [at] gmail.com

Campaign breadheads confirmed to appear at the event so far include Richard Bertinet, Yann Legallais and Manuel Monade, Jane Mason, Vincent Talleu, Andrew Whitley and Chris Young.

Cake & Bake Show lightning Twitter comp and discount
Yes, the ‘cake’ comes first but the organisers are showing their continued commitment to Real Bread. The Campaign doughmongers appearing at Earl’s Court over the weekend of 13-15 September are Richard Bertinet, Aidan Chapman, Duncan Glendinning, Tom Herbert, Jane Mason and Patrick Moore.

For details of how Campaign members can WIN one of four pairs of tickets we have to give away on 8 August, click here.

If you’re not a winner today, the organisers are offering Campaign members advance purchase tickets for just £10 (usually £14.50). For your discount code, click here. 

Great Taste Awards
Great to see so many Campaign members picking Great Taste Awards. Special congratulations to Patrick Moore and co. at More? Artisan, who led the bread/flour pack with two three Gold Star awards. Read the full list here.

Real Bread enterprise

World Bread Awards
Don’t forget that entries for the World Bread Awards (including Real Bread Campaign, home baker and kids categories, plus people’s choice nominations) – close on 31 August. Enter/nominate here.

Farmshop & Deli Awards
A gong always looks good on a Real Bread bakery’s advertising and promotion materials and here’s one you might like to go for. If you don’t run a bakery, then you can vote for your favourite. To do either, click here.

Community Assets and Services Grants
Planning a Community Supported Bakery or community right to buy project to save your local bakery?  Then you might be eligible for one of these grants.

July

Bit freaked out by that big yellow burning ball thingy in the sky and all that blue stuff where the clouds usually live, but rather enjoying it?  Yes, summer’s here and seems to be lasting more than the customary single afternoon.*

Now our Big Lottery Local Food programme and Sheepdrove Trust funding has come to an end, office volunteer Pete and I are working harder than ever to get everything in place for Together We Rise, the new project designed to be a main ingredient in the second proof of the Real Bread Campaign.

Meanwhile, new volunteer Danni has just picked up editorial duties on compiling our second book, which will celebrate some of the fantastic Real Bread bakers we’ve got to know over the past four years or so.

*Spare a thought for the bakers wrestling to keep dough fermentation in control, though…

The Upper Crust

Together We Rise
We’re working to secure funding for this new project, which is designed to help people living with mental health issues, (or otherwise facing a tougher time than most of us) to benefit from the therapeutic, social and employment opportunities that making Real Bread by hand offers. As part of our research, we’d love to hear from you if you’ve faced any of these challenges and have found bread making helpful in one way or another. We’d also like to hear from therapists, bakers, and other professionals who’ve helped people to benefit from baking.

To help us with a very short survey, please click here.

Local Loaves for Lammas
It is the Real Bread Campaign’s fifth year of encouraging people to celebrate this ancient harvest festival on and around 1 August by buying a local loaf, or baking their own. Find out more and discover (or add..c’mon slowcoaches!) details of local Lammas events here.

More crumbs

New True Loaf – out now!
Forgive our lack of modesty but yet again the new issue of our exclusive members’ magazine is, as that chap on the telly might say, a good bake.  You can WIN an Eezi-Slice breadboard; Gaye Whitwam and Mary Parry share stories of baking in schools; Bex Clarke visits Bread Hero: The Better Health Bakery; Danielle Ellis looks at restaurants which understand the importance of Real Bread on their menus; Chris Young chats to River Cottage bread handbook author Daniel Stevens and marches over to The Veterans’ Artisan Bakery; ideas to help Britain celebrate Sourdough September; and more…

The mag went in the post to UK Campaign members last week and paperless members can download it here.

Not a Campaign member? Then read why and how to join us here.

Crumb together!
On 25 June, Ethical Eats, The Better Health Bakery, The Hornbeam Bakers' Collective, Unpackaged and the Real Bread Campaign hosted a workshop for community cafés, caterers and food enterprises. As the last event of our Local Food funded work, the aim was to help them make Real Bread available to their customers, either by baking it themselves or buying from a local, independent bakery. See photos here.

Real Bread enterprise

We need your recipes for Real Bread book 2
Inspired by the huge success of Knead to Know (publisher Grub Street’s first run just sold out in less than a month), we're writing a book to celebrate the rise of Real Bread in Britain. As well as raising awareness, it will also help raise funds to help us to continue championing the cause. If you bake loaves for sale and you’d be willing to donate one of your recipes and share your Real Bread story, the book's editor Danni Rochman would love to hear from you.  You can let us know what sort of Real Bread you’re offering here.

If you have any questions, please contact Danni: danni [at] sustainweb.org

Want to sell Knead to Know?
On the subject of books, if you’d like to sell Knead to Know thorough your bakery, mill, cookery school, equipment shop, online shop, whatever, you can find details of how to here.

Sourdough September sign up
Passionate about ‘wild’ yeast? Then help us to help you and all other sourdough aficionados demystify and share the benefits and delights of totally naturally leavened loaves. Please let us know how you’ll be getting involved in Sourdough September.

Classified ads
Ads posted in the past month include job vacancies at eight Real Bread bakeries around the UK (and one in Malaysia!), and both a flour mill and a bakery for sale. To find and add Real Bread classified ads click here.

June

Those of you running or planning microbakeries, Community Supported Bakeries and all other sorts of small Real Bread enterprises will be happy to hear that the wait to get your floury fingers on our book Knead to Know is over. The PDF is all well and good, but there’s joy to be had from unsticking pages welded together with dough.

Thanks to all of you who got involved in helping us to spread the Real Bread message and raise some dough during Real Bread Maker Week. It’s been great to read stories from new home bakers, of unloved bread machines dusted off, and bakeries telling us of new customers.

Looking ahead, we’re helping to run a Real Bread workshop for community food enterprises in June and I need YOUR help to make sure Local Loaves for Lammas and Sourdough September are as successful as Real Bread Maker Week.

Well, for these and more crumbs of what’s going on in the Real Bread movement, please read on…

Upper Crust

Knead to Know – back in print!
After more than a year since the limited edition first run sold out, thanks to specialist food and drink publisher Grub Street, Knead to Know is back on bookshelves. Whatever small Real Bread enterprise you’re planning or running, Knead to Know is the guide to success in bringing Real Bread to the heart of your local community. For full details of the book and our exclusive 33% discount offer, click here.

Real Bread Maker Week – cleaning down the bench
Thanks to those of you who got involved, so far we have harvested in donations totalling more than £2500 to help fund our charitable work.  

• Dough raisers' Roll of Honour
• Media coverage
• Competition winner

We still want to see your photos and read your stories from the week so we can publish our favourites. Read how here.

Real Bread Maker Week will return in May 2014 – can’t say we didn’t give you enough notice!

Other crumbs

Ex-offenders turn dough tenders
Recently, Campaign member Virtuous Bread has been working to help ex-offenders in Manchester to become Bread Angels. One person inspired by her lessons with Rosie Clark to set up her own Real Bread social enterprise is new Campaign member Francesca Barker. Read the first chapter in her story, and how you can be part of The Barker Baker’s future, here.

True Loaf – any news?
If you have any snippets of bready things you’ll be up to between July and September, please drop us a short line THIS WEEK and we’ll see how many we can squeeze into the next issue of our members’ magazine. Please also add details to our events calendar so everyone can see them. realbread [at] sustainweb.org

Lessons in Loaf
Is your school a Food For Life school? Has it run a great Real Bread initiative? If so, the school could stand the chance of winning the Soil Association Organic Food Award for Best School Community Initiative. For details click here.

Real Bread enterprise

Crumb Together: community food café/enterprise Real Bread workshop
Sibling Sustain projects Ethical Eats and the Real Bread Campaign have teamed up with The Better Health Bakery and The Hornbeam Bakers’ Collective to run a workshop in east London on 25 June. Places are available only to people from community cafés / community food enterprises with a genuine plan to put Real Bread on their menus. For full details click here.

Job vacancies
Part of the support your Campaign offers to Real Bread bakers is our classified ads page. Jobs for budding Real Bread bakers we’ve published recently include vacancies at The Bertinet Bakery in Bath, Daylesford in Gloucestershire, Forge Bakehouse in Sheffield, The Handmade Bakery in Yorkshire, Leeds Bread Co-op, Woodstock’s Artisan Bakery in Buckinghamshire and a new organic store in Tunbridge Wells. To find and add Real Bread classified ads click here.

FREE Making Local Food Work support
A reminder that if you run a community food enterprise you might be eligible for free support arranged by Plunkett Foundation. This would be tailored to your specific needs and could include business, marketing and even baking advice and mentoring from an experienced Real Bread baker. For more details click here.

Is your Real Bread wild at heart?
Sourdough September will be the first ever national event dedicated to celebrating naturally-leavened Real Bread. If you have a love for lactobacilli, a passion for preferments*, are moonstruck by microbes and want the Campaign’s help to share this with the nation, we need to know NOW how you’ll be getting involved. To really get the demystifying message out there beyond the usual crowd, we need to get glossy food mags on board and they work months in advance. For a few suggestions of how you can be your local cultural champion, click here.

* yeah, I know you can make preferments with commercial yeast as well, but I’m on an alliterative roll here…

Local Loaves for Lammas
Join the celebrations on and around 1 August. To stand the chance of being featured in our media release to more than 200 journalists around the UK, please add details of your event to our calendar now! For details click here.

End crust

Someone give this man (and his simply fab t-shirt – where did he get it?) his own TV show now!

Campaign member Vincent Talleu’s Real Bread making video guide, which has been watched more than 58,500 times in just two weeks.

May

Finally, it’s here!

Yes, after months of chivvying the bread lovers of Britain to join our annual nationwide extravaganza, Real Bread Maker Week begins tomorrow, Saturday 11 May.

In case you missed it somehow, the gist of the week is to help the people of Britain celebrate Real Bread and its makers, be they the bakers on our high streets, machines at the back of cupboards, or the ones at the end of our arms.

As the end of our Big Lottery Local Food programme and Sheepdrove Trust funded work is fast approaching, we’re also asking everyone to help secure our future: we’ve got great new plans to help people having a tougher time than most of us but we need the dough to do it.

We hope we can count on YOUR support.

Even if you do nothing else, this aint Fight Club, so the first rule is tell EVERYONE about Real Bread Maker Week!

Upper crust

Please DO get shirty with us
In support of the Campaign, the very nice people at Balcony Shirts have created a LIMITED EDITION Real Bread t-shirt just for us. The exclusive design is available in male, female and child styles and, being very nice people, Balcony Shirts will donate £4 to the Campaign (£3 child sizes) for every one they sell. Hurry: buy yours NOW at balconyshirts.co.uk

WIN £150 to spend on bakery bits
Thanks to Campaign member bakerybits.co.uk, simply by tweeting a photo of yourself wearing your EXCLUSIVE Real Bread tee in the most unusual place you can think of you could WIN £150 to spend on baking equipment and ingredients. Find full #realbreadcomp details and rules here.

Fantastic Real Bread online auction
No, we’re not auctioning off loaves…

From Saturday morning, you'll have just seven days to bid for the opportunity to meet and learn from some of the Real Bread movement’s best-known and respected bakers, Campaign ambassadors Aidan Chapman, Emmanuel Hadjiandreou, Tom Herbert and Andrew Whitley. Also on offer are an exclusive ‘Meet the Miller’ tour of Shipton Mill with its owner John Lister; and sacks (literally) of flour from Essex family miller Marriage’s. Find out more here.

More crumbs

Offers
The special offers companies are making in support of Real Bread Maker Week include: A third off of every Brook Bakery School Real Bread class booked and paid for between 11 and 17 May; and The Real Bread Campaign Organic Bundle, available exclusively from the Doves Farm website, representing a 20% saving against the items if purchased separately; and 20% off bread flours bought from Marriage’s website during Real Bread Maker Week. Find details of these and more here.

Some of the nice things people are doing for us
It’s great to see so many activities on our events calendar and special thanks to people who’re using the week to raise some dough for us. Perhaps something here will make you think 'aha - now that's something I could do, too!'

• Cinnamon Square in Rickmansworth are running a children's bread making workshop and donating all proceeds to the Campaign.
• Bread Matters are donating £4 for every new starter kit they sell, and running a fundraising raffle at a special dinner they're holding in conjunction with Café St Honoré.
• Bread At Home will be taking Real Bread to sell at work donating 50p per loaf to the Campaign
• Leicester Born and Bread is donating 10% of all sales during Real Bread Maker Week to the Campaign.
• Joe's Bakery in Bristol is launching a new 'National Loaf' made from organic stoneground wholemeal and white flour and donating 50p from each one sold to the Campaign.

You can find (and add, it’s not too late…) details of these and more local events, offers and other activities on our calendar here.

Upgrade from supporter to Campaign member
Are you a Campaign member, or do you simply benefit from a FREE listing for your loaves on our Real Bread Finder, or just subscribe to Breadcrumbs? If you care about the state of bread in Britain and want the Campaign to be able to continue its work please JOIN US TODAY!

Sippets

• Many traditional flour mills will be opening their doors on 11 and/or 12 May for National Mills Weekend.
• Join bakers around the globe for this month’s #breadchat on Twitter from 8-9pm on Wednesday 15 May.
• The producers of ITV series Britain’s Best Bakery (won by Campaign member Hambleton Bakery last year) are looking for entrants for the new series. To take part or nominate a bakery call 0207 985 7568 or email bestbakery[at]shine.tv

April

The countdown to Real Bread Maker Week is on! Even if you’re not planning to organise an event, there are ways you can join in the fun and help raise money for the Campaign.

I’m trying to keep this edition short but must give space to saying thanks to outgoing office volunteer Bex Clarke for all of her help since last summer.

PS – Sorry if you were expecting ‘crumbs in mid-March. It’s been kinda frantic around the office.

Upper crust

Real Bread Maker Week
It’ll be with us before you know it – May 11-17, to be exact. Lined up from here we’ll have an online auction of some great bready lots and a fab, limited edition Real Bread t-shirt. In case you haven’t made your own plans yet, last week we published a guide of how you can get involved in helping us to raise dough to do good. You can download your copy and read more about the week here.

Free Real Bread class for school teachers
Like to teach your pupils how to bake Real Bread, would find a workshop useful to help build your confidence and can make it to central London on 7 May? Then click here for details.

New True Loaf: address check
If you’ve taken the step beyond following our work by subscribing as a Campaign member, then True Loaf will be on its way to you in the first week of April. If you’ve moved since you last received a copy, then please let us know your new address.

If you’ve not yet become a Campaign member and would like to read our exclusive, quarterly full-colour magazine, please join us today. 

More crumbs

Wheat seeds for school projects
The Brockwell Bake Association can offer small quantities of Dammant spring seed wheat to schools and community gardens while stocks last.  Find more about this and other places to get wheat for your Bake Your Lawn project here.

Cake & Bake Show
Following the success of its first outing in London last autumn, this Friday the show ventures to Manchester. Campaign folks working to keep it real amongst all the cakery over the three days will be Patrick Moore, Aidan Chapman, Tom Herbert, Duncan Glendinning and Patrick Ryan. Find full details here.

Comic Relief
Inspiration for your Real Bread Maker Week event? Thanks to Flour Power, Flour Station and Poilane for donating Real Bread that helped Comic Relief HQ’s bake sale raise £3116 for Red Nose Day.

Real Bread enterprise

Apprenticeship grants
The National Apprenticeship Service is offering grants of up to £1,500 to eligible employers taking on paid apprentices aged between 16 and 24. This in addition to the training costs of the Apprenticeship framework. For full details, click here.

Real Bread job vacancies
They keep comin’ in and we keep publishin’ them here.

Funding
We’ve posted plenty of funding opportunities that might be of use to local Real Bread enterprises and projects in The Real Baker-e.

Sippets

• Thanks to Peter Cook for putting together a, sadly unsuccessful, bid to get a Real Bread stand at this year’s Glastonbury Festival.
• Nominate a Real Bread bakery or campaigner for Observer Ethical Awards here
• A crowd funding bid to start producing a recycled, British made alternative to imported bannetons
• Congratulations to Campaign member Paul's Bakery in Melton Mowbray on topping Ethical Consumer magazine's bread shopping guide
• Vote for your fave Real Bread book, bakery and baking classes in Food and Travel Awards here
• Help us make some noise with Thunderclap
• A few familiar names in Campaign member Signe Johansen’s roundup of London bakeries for the Financial Times

February

Well, we’re continuing the momentum we gathered in January with activities including a gathering for Campaign members and Lessons in Loaf workshop for teachers. We're keeping the Real Bread message in the headlines and on the airwaves, including a couple of appearances on BBC2 and even DW, the German equivalent of the World Service!
Looking ahead, we’re working on gathering support for Real Bread Maker Week in May, looking at ways to cut bread waste, finding funding for our work…oh, all sorts of great stuff.
Don’t forget you can find the latest updates in The Real Baker-e and our Twitter and Facebook feeds but for now, please read on.

Ah yes, if you’re based London way and reckon you could spare a day (or more) a week, I need a hand around the office, please…

Upper Crust

Real Bread Maker Week - raising dough to do good!
May really isn’t that far away so please get thinking NOW about how YOU will help us to raise not only awareness but also funds to help the rise of Real Bread in Britain. We’ll be publishing handy fundraising guides on our website soon but in the meantime, please take a mo to have a look at the new work we’re raising money to do. 

Join us for discounts on Real Bread classes
As if the opportunity to support our great work and the invitation to join our mutually-supportive national network of your fellow Real Bread lovers isn’t enough, just check out the discounts that at least 35 of the 100+ Real Bread classes we know offer to our members. The latest is courtesy of Cooper & Whites Artisan Workshops, taught by Hambleton Bakery’s Paul White.

Campaign office volunteer opportunity
After seven months of helping Chris at Real Bread HQ, Bex Clarke is moving on from office volunteering in search of something more hands-on. With thanks to Bex for her generous support, Chris now needs someone else to help get the job done. You can find full details of the opportunity here.

More crumbs

Bake Your Lawn
If you’re thinking of planting a handful of spring wheat at a local school so kids can follow the Real Bread journey from seed to sandwich, now’s the time to get sowing! You can download our sow it, mill it, bake it, eat it guide here. 

You can find inspiring stories and pictures from some of the hundreds of schools that have baked their lawns over the past couple of years here.

Let’s get Real Bread making into ALL schools!
The government has launched a consultation on plans for a National Curriculum food. If like us you believe that Real Bread making, healthy eating lessons, how to decipher food labels and food growing should be part of every child’s education, now’s the time to have your say here.

Clervaux Bakery
The Big Lottery’s Local Food programme is sponsoring Chris to visit another project it funds, Campaign member Clervaux Bakery. Chris’s report will appear in the next True Loaf, which will also feature The Veterans’ Artisan Bakery. These are just two of the great organisations with which our proposed new project will allow us to work more closely.

The Great Comic Relief Bake Off
As a warm up for Real Bread Maker Week, here’s another great cause for which you might like to get baking.

Real Bread enterprise

Real Bread book
We’ll have exciting news about Knead to Know for you very soon but in the meantime, we’re working on a new book to celebrate some of the 550+ Real Bread bakers we know around the UK and beyond. If you’d like to contribute one of your own recipes, please let us know by email: realbread [at] sustainweb.org 

Gizza job!
The latest Real Bread job vacancies we’ve received details about are at Henderson’s Artisan Bakery & Cafe in Salisbury, e5 Bakehouse and Debaere in London, The Bakery Dunbar and Dumouchel Patisserie near Leeds. For details click here.

Are you this year’s Young British Foodies baking star?
The YBFs Foundation ‘is here to shine a spotlight on this grassroots talent (in the annual awards) and provide a springboard to success with world class mentoring and commercial opportunities.’  The winner in last year's baking category was Campaign member Bridget Hugo of Bread Bread, so let's give this year's judges (including Campaign member Daniel Stevens, who wrote the River Cottage bread book) plenty of Real Bread to chew over this year. Read more and enter here.

Sippets

• Real Bread Campaign on the telly on 11 February and 17 February
• Bread Angels course helps Southwark locals to earn a crust
• Lessons in Loaf – photos from our recent teachers’ workshop
• Real Bread on German international radio
• School of Slow online Real Bread videos by Campaign member The Handmade Bakery.

End crust

Thanks to the 80 or so of you who joined us at the Real Bread get together last month. There were some great ideas shared and new friendships made. You can find links to snaps from the family album and stories from the day here.

January

Happy New Year!

We’re off to a flying start with a teachers’ workshop this week, the gathering next Thursday and funding bids going off left, tight and centre.

So without further ado, here’s the lowdown.

If you’re one of the 100 people joining us on the 24th, I look forward to seeing you there and perhaps we’ll get chance to chat.

Upper Crust

New True Loaf
The latest issue of our magazine went in the post to paid-up Campaign members last week.  As well as a chance to WIN a copy of Microbakin' by Mick Hartley, features include Albert Smith's social enterprise with people living with mental health issues, The Tiny Bakery's Use Your Loaf scheme for the benefit of disadvantaged local people; Bread Hero: Mair's Bakehouse; Robin van Creveld community baking in Lewes; Bex Clarke looks at bread clubs; Steve Watson on eco-ovens; Ottavia Mazzoni's reports on bread in Italy; Alex Poulter on his Bristol bakery; plus much more… Campaign members can download the PDF version here.

Real Bread get together
The gathering at The School of Artisan Food in Nottinghamshire on 24 January for current (and potential) Campaign members includes short talks from Campaign ambassadors Emmanuel Hadjiandreou, Tom Herbert and Andrew Whitley. The free event is now fully-booked but for full details of the afternoon and how to join the cancellation waitlist click here.

More news

Future plans  
The Campaign has great plans to help people facing social exclusion to take advantage of the social, therapeutic and employment opportunities that Real Bread making offers. Click here for further details.

Membership plea
The Campaign being able to do this proposed new work depends on getting the dough to do so.  Chris is busy writing to grant funders but we’re always open to other offers. And if you’re one of the 700 people who’ve been ignoring, or simply deleting, emails requesting that you make your membership payment, or one of thousands more who’ve not ever got beyond signing up for this free enewsletter, now’s your chance to help the Campaign. Click here to visit our membership page.

Discounts
The most recent lovely people to offer Real Bread class discounts to Campaign members are Jamie’s Farm in Wiltshire, Cocoa & Heart’s in Bexleyheath and Bread Matters in Peebleshire. Find details of these and more than 100 class providers around the UK here.

Formal consultation on the Bread and Flour Regulations 1998
Defra is reviewing the continued need for mandatory fortification of flour in England with calcium, iron, niacin and thiamin.  We're working on the Campaign's response but you might also be interested in submitting your own. Find the consultation here.

Food writing competition
Are you, or do you know someone who is, an 11 to 18 year old wordsmith?  If so, the Guild of Food Writers’ annual Write It competition offers an opportunity to help spread the word about Real Bread. Young ’uns are invited to submit a non-fiction feature of around 750 words on any food-related subject.  The winner will receive a library of the books shortlisted for the 2013 Guild of Food Writers’ Awards. He or she will also enjoy a visit to delicious magazine’s test kitchen, and the winning piece will be published on the delicious website. For more information please visit gfw.co.uk

Real Bread enterprise

Jobs and voluntary placements
Real Bread bakeries seeking employees this month include The Thoughtful Bread Company near Bath/Bristol and Breadshare in the Scottish Borders. On the voluntary opportunities front, placements are being offered by Slow  Bread Co. in Chiswick and a new social enterprise in Kenya.

Real Bread Maker Week
We’ll be posting the outline for this year’s main Real Bread celebration (11-17 May) in The Real Baker-e and emailing them to bakers with Real Bread Finder records soon. In the meantime, get your thinking caps on as to how you will help raise awareness of Real Bread - It’ll be here before you know it!

New funding for rural community enterprises
The Plunkett Foundation has announced a new support service for rural communities. The service offers advisor support, training and feasibility grants of up to £2,000 to help rural communities set up community owned services like bakeries, shops and pubs.. The support is specifically designed for groups at the early planning stages to help them progress to the next stage. To be eligible community groups have to raise at least £10,000 themselves through community shares. For more information click here. Contact The Plunkett Foundation: 01993 810730 or email: info [at] plunkett.co.uk.

Sippets

• Another school lawn baked!
• Real Bread blog: Since the last ’crumbs, we’ve published three posts on our blog. Read Tony Homfray, Simon Rowan and Vicky North's articles here.
• Britain’s Best Bakery: Just before Christmas, Hambleton Bakery pipped fellow Real Bread Campaign member Dunbar Community Bakery to the title of Britain’s Best Bakery in the eponymous ITV show. Congratulations to them and to all of the other bakeries who flew the Real Bread flag during the series.

End crust

Not sure I’d want to advertise just how many factory loaves I’d bought so publically, but I have to say I think this student recycled art project looks great.