Making bread in medieval times was done in various ways so there was a wide range of bread recipes.

BREAD RECIPES

Whilst we know that bread was the main staple food of medieval people, it is hard to find any 100% definitive medieval bread recipes that have been passed down. History sources such as Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” act as some of our best guides and references on medieval food. Chaucer’s miller, for example, made reference to a variety of bread names and how these breads were eaten.

Some of the key points we do know about medieval bread making include:

· Ale-barm was used for raising the dough; its equivalent today would be brown ale + fresh yeast.
· Wheat flour made the finest, whitest bread
· Honey was often used when making bread with wheat flour
· Rye bread was the common bread baked by peasants

The most common way to bake bread was done by the poor; peasants would take their usually meagre amount of grain and grind it by hand in a wooden mortar or a stone trough. They would then mix it with water and bake what was known as unleavened bread (or oatcakes). The baking was done by placing the dough under an upturned pot placed on the ‘down-hearth’ – this was the flat stone in the centre of the floor of their one room hut on which the fire was built. The embers would keep the stone hot for some time so it was ideal for baking in this way.

It is possible to bake a medieval style bread using today’s ingredients. We will revisit this subject with recipes for making medieval style wheat, rye and barley breads.