Growing the stuff to make bread

[PurpleDragon]

Spookily enough, considering the new breadmaking thread - my DH and I were discussing this last night.

We were wondering just how much grain it would take to keep you in flour for breadmaking - how much land you would need to grow the stuff, how easy it would be to grow, harvest, thresh, and so on.

At the risk of sounding like a complete townie, what sort of grain would one use anyway?

Does everyone buy their own flour to make their bread, or does anyone do it completely from scratch?

[Chickpea]

Bread is made from wheat flour. Trouble is, the bread you're used to is made of strong wheat flour which contains extra gluten, but won't grow in this country. The wheat you could grow in Britain is soft wheat which is lower in gluten. Nice for fairy cakes, but it makes heavy solid bread. Nothing wrong with the bread - it's what people ate for thousands of years. But most Britons are used to Mother's Pride - as light as a ceiling tile and about the same flavour and nutritional value.

[PurpleDragon]

Mother Pride is like eating foam! I can't stand the stuff. I eat Warburtons which is one of the dearer loaves but at least it is edible!

[Wombat]

Oh bugger!

I think I still owe Andy an article on small scale wheat growing!

Nev

[PurpleDragon]

Well I for one will certainly be interested when you write it :)

[Andy Hamilton]

They grew enough wheat in kew gardens for a loaf of bread they needed 1m sq to make one loaf. I bought some bread flour the other day that was from oxford I thought that you can grow it here??

You could also make other types of flour like acorn flour, but it taste awful.

I think you can make chestnut flour which could be nicer.

[Stonehead]

Don't forget wheat is just one of the cereals that be used to make bread. Other good choices for the UK - well, if you don't mind or enjoy heavier breads - include barley, bere (an ancient form of barley), oats, rye and possibly buckwheat. Outside the UK, you could try maize, rice or sorghum if you live in warmer parts.

Oat bread made with honey is absolutely delicious, while good rye bread is pretty good too. All four can be used to make commercial wheat flours go further.

Some of the best sources for finding out how to grow small-scale, hand sown and hand harvested cereal crops are experimental archaeologists, as the know-how has generally been lost in the West.

The main, non-weather and soil type related, issues are getting the seed in small quantities, maintaining soil fertility and keeping on top of weeds.

Health food and pet shops can be sources of seed, but you'll need to see if the seed sprouts by soaking it, then placing it on damp paper. The main possibilities are unhulled barley, buckwheat, unhulled oats, rye, and wheat (sometimes called wheat berries).

If you can't get much seed, grow what you can, harvest all the seed and eat none; then repeat for a couple of years until you have enough to reserve some for seed and some for eating. A slow process!

If you are near a farm, you may be able to cadge a couple of kilos of barley, oats or wheat seed but remember, this has been selected for modern intensive agriculture so you won't necessarily get a good result.

A 10ft by 10ft area in southern England with good weather, good fertility and regularly weedng should grow enough soft wheat for 15-20 loaves of bread, according to an archaeologist I used to know. Oats and barley were less, but their yields would be comparatively higher on different soil types or where the climate didn't suit wheat.

For grinding small amounts of flour, a coffee mill is very good. Good quality food processors also do the job well (cheap ones can burn out or have the blades out).


Oh, and watch out for the European seed laws. It is illegal to sell or exchange seeds which are not on the European seed catalogues, and seeds cannot be used without the permission of the Plant Breeders ' Rights owner when they are proprietary.

While you can save or exchange seed, the big companies have the governments firmly on side and do everything they can to stop this - both legally and technically. So some cereal crops, for instance, are no longer self-pollinating and require intervention to get fertile seeds. More info here.

[Diana]

Call me soft (thank you), but it might be a bit too much work for the results.

However, if you could get 2 or 3 people together who all wanted to try it + could share the work, keep up morale...hmm, now there's something to think about

[bazil]

"Oh, and watch out for the European seed laws. It is illegal to sell or exchange seeds which are not on the European seed catalogues, and seeds cannot be used without the permission of the Plant Breeders '
Rights owner when they are proprietary"

this stuff makes me mad

its the little people who want to play with the old seeds...its no threat to huge farm culture(yet)
the big boys step out of line all the time and wot do they get(tumbleweed blowing in wind) nothing


im a huge fan of heritage seeds and feel they are important in that variety is the spice of life

the day that gmo seeds take over is the day that i take up hunting(for skins and scalps)

[Wombat]

Lemme know Baz and I'll come with you......

Nev

[Dave]

Lamb's quarters/Goosefoot or good king henry is just coming into seed in the UK at the moment. I know that reletives of this plant such as quinoa is made into a flour and then made into tortillas. The seeds are normal dried first then ground. I've left some to seed in my garden and my get one tortilla out of it but it would be interesting to gather enough to make a loaf. Perhaps mixing it with ground roast chestnut and a little wheat flour.

Have you made a buckwheat loaf then Stoney I think Goosefoot has similar properties - does it come out more like a rye bread?

[Stonehead]

Lamb's quarters/Goosefoot or good king henry is just coming into seed in the UK at the moment. I know that reletives of this plant such as quinoa is made into a flour and then made into tortillas. The seeds are normal dried first then ground. I've left some to seed in my garden and my get one tortilla out of it but it would be interesting to gather enough to make a loaf. Perhaps mixing it with ground roast chestnut and a little wheat flour.

Have you made a buckwheat loaf then Stoney I think Goosefoot has similar properties - does it come out more like a rye bread?

Straight buckwheat must be made with a sour dough starter, and comes out as a dense, crumbly dark bread. It has a very pronounced sour flavour. I like it, but most people I've tried it on prefer it tempered!

It's better made in a cake tin than a loaf tin, and cut into wedges instead of slices because it's quite crumbly and doesn't slice well.

You could make a loaf with 80-90% wheat flour and 10-20% buckwheat, so you get some of the flavour without being overwhelmed. This also allows you to use yeast.

Or, for something really interesting, make potato-buckwheat bread and cover it with really fresh honey.

[the.fee.fairy]

the opat bread made with honey sounds nice...any good recipes stoney (easy ones...) ta

[Luath]

Useful info there from Stonehead, and others, so thanks for that. This is one of my projects to get on with. I have the hand mill, and buy wheat in to grind, but am desparate to grow the grain int he first place too. have earmarked a good bed for the trial, will try and keep some records, but that's really not my strong point.

Need an extra day in the week..................

Rekindled enthusiasm now.