Britain needs better bread. But we’d prefer a Greggsnut

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/21/britain-needs-better-bread-greggsnut

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We Brits never really learned to value bread. The news that Greggs has stopped selling bread in many of its stores because “customer shopping habits and needs are changing” (that is, people don’t buy it any more) seems largely to have been greeted with indifference and, in “real bread” circles, sighs of relief.

In any case when I think of Greggs I don’t think of bread but rather of pasties, sausage rolls and the sugary siren that sings to me lovingly from behind plate glass: the Greggsnut – a glazed, caramel-filled, mutant lovechild of a croissant and a doughnut.

Had a major “baker” stopped selling bread in France, there might have been a riot. But then in France, bread has always been highly political and a potent metaphor for the divide between the haves and have nots, between those who ate white bread and those stuck with black. Bad kings were labelled “grain hoarders”, good ones “bakers”, revolutions were sparked by the cost of bread and, indeed, the French government fixed its price until the late 1970s.

In Germany there might have been indignation. Walk around its cities, be it Bochum or Berlin, and the national bakery chains fill their windows with sumptuous displays of glossy, golden loaves that are to a British supermarket loaf what a BMW is to a Rover.

Despite war, pestilence and the advent of reality TV, good bread remains central to the cuisine of those northern European nations that can actually boast a cuisine. That it isn’t in Britain says a lot about the fate of our food culture.

We might gaze at artisan loaves but still begrudge or can’t spare the money

The first tragedy to befall it was the enclosure movement of the 18th century, severing the link between the people, the land and their food. By the Victorian era manufactured food was widely adulterated, so much so that the epidemiologist John Snow established a link between alum in bread and rickets. Then the first world war scythed through a generation of artisans and took much of their knowledge with it. And when the Chorleywood industrialised bread process was developed in 1961, a nation for which rationing was still a fresh memory was simply grateful that mass production had put enough on the table once more, even if the bread was a bit soggy.

Of course, in the last decade or so there has been a revival of artisan baking. When I made a series for BBC Radio 4, I met a slew of amazing people for whom baking was less of a job and more a calling. And yet little has changed in wider attitudes. Many people think nothing of parting with four quid for a pint or three for a coffee, but spending a similar sum on a loaf of properly crafted bread strikes them as outrageous profligacy, the preserve of hipsters and smug middle-class foodies. But a pint or a coffee is a treat. Bread is a staple. And in food bank Britain, staples remain beyond the reach of far too many.

Bread remains the bellwether for our national attitude towards food. We love watching people bake bread on TV but don’t have time to do it ourselves. We might gaze at artisan loaves but still begrudge or can’t spare the money. Above all we’re a nation that will grab a pie or pasty on the run rather than make a sandwich or take a salad into work. So if we’re buying less bread, good or bad, that tells us something more.

Greggs is the state of the nation’s stomach. And it’s costing the NHS in excess of £20bn a year to fix the consequences of our collective diet; obesity, heart disease, diabetes. No major party had the Greggsnuts during the election campaign to talk about taking on a food industry that we are in effect subsidising through our spending on the NHS. But don’t blame Greggs. If we wanted better food and a healthier society we’d demand it. Perhaps the Greggsnut is the people’s new opiate. Pass me one, would you?