Spelt bread

Here is a FANTASTIC recipe for almost instant bread made with spelt flour, which was first brought to Britain by the Romans, and which has more taste than your average supermarket flour.

500g spelt flour
10g fast-acting dried yeast
a good pinch of sea salt
50g sunflower seeds
50g sesame seeds
50g linseeds
500ml warm water

Combine all the dry ingredients, then mix in the water. Pour into a greased bread tin, and bake for nearly an hour at 200C. Take it out of the tin and put it back in the oven for a couple of minutes.


This was in the Telegraph Magazine a couple of weeks ago, and came from Sybille Wilkinson, an Austrian whose husband Andrew grows spelt at Gilchesters Farm, Northumberland. Spelt grows nearly six foot tall, but doesn't fall over - modern wheat crops have to be given chlormequat, a chemical growth regulator which is supposed to strengthen the straw. In 2003 50% of 144 baked bread samples (in Britain) turned out to have residues of this chemical. It's a strong argument for organic, and for biodiversity.