(from British Baker, first published June 2000)

Literacy is a bigger problem for our trade than we care to admit. I’m not talking about faultless grammar, or extraordinary vocabulary. Simply being able to read and write in a basic form. I regret the times I’ve berated an employee for not following written method, or seen instructions disregarded for the cleaning routine, only to be told in a quieter moment that he can’t read.

Occasionally dyslexia has been the explanation, but too often lack of education has been the cause. And it angers me. Yes, I’ve thought perhaps they might be lying, hiding a careless and casual approach to work behind a glib claim, but I’ve been proven wrong. Some of our employees cannot read, and this is a problem we must be more open and aware of.

As a trade we have often been one of few options for students who fail in our school system. Many hardworking, dedicated and loyal bakers strengthen our craft, only to be hindered by a fear of the written word. How can this be?. When I look at illegible handwriting, or find an employee in panic as he is faced with a safety manual, it deeply concerns me. For once a student leaves our education system, a fair amount of the onus and duty falls upon us to continue a young employee’s education. Not just to create an understanding of safety and responsibility in the workplace, but to enrich and further our craft.

The scholar bakers of a hundred years ago, such as Jago, Kirkland, and Goodfellow, demonstrated in rich detailed text the breadth of knowledge we have in our craft to pass on to students. We might find fault with their work now, and question assumptions and beliefs they held true. But their text showed just how necessary it is to offer more than a list of percentages and scant method to describe our work, if we are to create excellence in the workplace.

Now, if I have employees who cannot read the label on a bottle of detergent, yet demonstrate a willingness and care towards their routine work, how can I hope to pass on more than a small percentage of that knowledge to them. Listen, I know how to talk and demonstrate, but I know that nothing can replace the clarity given by the ability to read and write.

Certainly, for the fortunate students who leave our dedicated bakery colleges around the country, we know they leave college with a comparatively strong grounding in the theory of our trade. However, many aspiring bakers join our ranks as unskilled labour, too often cheap labour working in plant bakeries to satisfy the ‘hand-made’ claim from factory producers.

I believe that we have a duty to offer the possibility of betterment to these men, beyond the meagre wage packet, and literacy is a fine place to start. Be vigilant and identify employees who are struggling to read and write, take them to one side and talk sensitively and quietly to them, and offer careful guidance. Find out about adult education in your area, get the leaflets and have them available. It’s a simple and easy thing for us to offer, and will make a difference to the quality and outlook within your bakery.

(from British Baker, first published June 2000)

Now my mother was a good cook. Don’t misunderstand me, but she had her own quirky way of rewriting a recipe. She’d look in the cupboard, see what needed to be used, and simply amend or even rewrite the recipe, perhaps like every good cook. The aim was a taste and a flavour that would keep us satisfied (and quiet).

For every success she had, the recipe would then be written in a dog-eared old folio, which became her culinary bible. No famous food author was too grand to distract her from an attempt to better the recipe. I grew up thinking that her way, her taste, represented the authentic way that dish should be prepared. Why did I think this? Because it tasted good, and over time during my childhood it became familiar.

When family friends from overseas came to visit, my mother would slave in the kitchen preparing the feast. To our guests, however, the dinner represented more than just a good meal. It was a glimpse of authentic English cooking. Authentic because my parents were British (they’ve since discarded their nationality in favour of an Australian one), and the food the guests ate reflected their background. So as recipes were exchanged over the dinner table, there was the possibility that these dishes would be carefully made in another kitchen and heralded as traditional. But only if the guests enjoyed the meal. You can be sure if they hadn’t, that recipe would have been binned before their plane took them home.

Customers will not purchase for a second time a product they did not like the first. Now yesterday I purchased a packet of Yorkshire Parkin, emblazoned with the words authentic and home-style. As I read through the list of ingredients, noting the glycerine, flavour enhancers, colorants and improvers, and reflected on its gummy, sickly taste, I wondered about the traditions the bakers referred to. No disrespect intended, as I’ve no doubt that someone somewhere passed the recipe on to them. Many of the post war British bread books, intended for the commercial baker, recommend an alarming list of ingredients, with methods that make the act of boiling a kettle seem complex. All of them talk lovingly about the traditions and heritage of our craft, then move swiftly on to set a few bizarre traditions of their own.

In fairness, they were trying maintain some standards whilst reflecting the pressure to supply the demand for the cheapest whitest bread, and I do hand much of the responsibility back to the price frantic consumer. But standards were set that were detrimental to the craft of baking in this country, and these recipes and methods are now ensconced under the terms authentic and traditional.

How often are poor sales ascribed to the muscle flexing of the multiples and the performance of the economy, when too often the product is shoddy and nasty – an excellent way to deter a repeat purchase. You can write ‘home-style’, ‘traditional’, ‘authentic’ or even ‘Granny’s own’ all over the package, but unless the excellence is there, the product will not succeed.

Do you really want to change things for the better? Then let go of every tradition that debases the bread we bake, and correct it now. To label and hide behind meaningless words is foolish, for it no more convinces the consumer than you or I. You want to trigger sales? Then label in a way that sells the flavour, texture and pleasure the loaf holds, and make sure it delivers those claims. Aggressively sell it as a good loaf, rather than an authentic one, and don’t be afraid to write the recipe from scratch. Remember, the only traditions that sell to consumers are those that provide the tastes they are looking for.