As the world closed down last year, many people began tending sourdough starters and baking. For some, it became more than a pastime
The past year will be remembered for many things, and the baking craze early in the pandemic will certainly be one of them. While some of us were nailing banana bread recipes – more than 45,000 pictures of these bakes were posted to Instagram in the first two months of lockdown – and naming sourdough starters in the hope that it would help keep them alive, others took their baking hobby to a whole new level.
Whether furloughed, experiencing redundancy, working from home or simply re-evaluating career choices, a number of home bakers decided this was the time to take the plunge. The Real Bread Campaign, whose annual Real Bread Week runs until Sunday, reports a surge in new microbakeries since last March, with keen home bakers launching a business at home and embarking on a life-changing floury adventure.
