Manchet Breads were some of the best quality leaven breads eaten in Medieval and Tudor Britain. Yet bread like this, made of double boulted (sieved through a cloth) stoneground wheat was always the exception. For much of Britain’s history most bread baked was commonly made from a mixture of coarser flour, made from various grains like rye and barley.
, (bread plates) used in feasts to eat food off of. However, for the privileged few, the very finest wheaten Manchet’s, or Pandemain (lord’s bread) were baked. Yet it also needs to be remembered that Medieval milling and boulting methods were never wholly successful in removing all of the bran from the ground wheat grain, even the best flour produced was an ‘off-white’ flour, rather than the pure white flour produced today by modern industrial roller milling and boulting methods.
Even so, this whiter manchet flour was desired by the rich upper classes because it made a lighter loaf, of finer texture. It was also far more expensive than mixed grain breads because it involved additional costs and labour and because a proportion of the grain (the larger bran particles etc.) was discarded in the boulting process, so that more grain was needed to produce the same amount of flour. Therefore this whiter, finer bread was a status symbol for those who could afford it.
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Active Dried Yeast: In a small bowl or jug pour in half the warm water, (250ml) dissolve in the sugar, and sprinkle in the yeast and stir it thoroughly with a plastic or wooden spoon. Leave to sit for 7 to 10 minutes in a warm place to allow the yeast to start to work. Check occasionally to see if the yeast is rising and frothing.
After about 4–5 minutes, it will have a creamy and slightly frothy appearance on top. Do not allow the yeast (barm) to sit longer than 12 minutes before using, leaving it too long will exhaust the yeast before it is in the dough. When ready, stir and pour in all the remaining warm water, 250ml.
Fresh Yeast: You need twice as much fresh yeast as dried yeast and you must use it in half the time after activating it. Make in exactly the same way as above.
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If you are using 650g of an 80% extraction rate bread flour from an artisan miller you do not have to sieve the flour
. Sprinkle in the ground sea salt – then with your fingers make sure you mix the ground sea salt in with the flour, so that it does not interfere with the yeast when added. Make a well in the centre of the flour.
By sieving the two flours you will aerate the 500g of white bread flour and sieve out about 50g of the largest wholemeal bran particles from the 200g of wholemeal flour – leaving about 650g of usable flour in total.
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When the yeast is fully activated (7 to 10 minutes) add the yeast water (barm) into the well made in the flour and bring the flour and water together into a dough with a wooden spoon.
Add some more plain white bread flour (if needed) until you form a firm dough which you can knead, it should still be on the ’sticky’ side, but not so that it is difficult to remove from the bowl. You are looking for it to be springy and elastic. Take the dough out of the bowl and onto a flat floured work surface.
Start kneading the dough to make your Manchet Bread for about 7 minutes. Kneading dough is a ‘push-pull’ technique to break the gluten and starches down in the flour.
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Kneading Technique: Hold one end of the dough with one hand and then with the palm of your other hand push the dough away from you, stretching it out. Once stretched (without breaking the dough) pull the dough back in and over with your fingers into a bigger lump once more. Give the dough a quarter turn then repeat. Giving the dough a quarter turn before stretching it back out works all of the dough over the 7 minutes and stretches the gluten out in different directions.
If sticking to the work surface or the dough is a little wet sprinkle over a little extra flour, it will probably need a few casts of extra flour over the 7 minutes, but do not over do it as too much extra flour will make the bread tough.
When ready it will become satiny and elastic, and when pressed with a finger tip the indentation in the dough will rise back out. Form the dough into a large ball, place it back in the floured bowl, cover with a clean, light cloth in a warm room until the bread dough has almost doubled in size – this could take up to 2 to 3 hours (depending on the temperature of the room).
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, this means to punch it once to remove most of the air out of it. Remove the dough, and gently knead it once more between your hands for two minutes.
Shape the dough into a ball and place on a greased non-stick baking tray, or a traditional bread baking stone. Important: Leave to rise once more for a further 35 to 45 minutes (this is called the second rise).
After the second rise use a sharp knife to cut a line into the top – not too deep or long, about 4cm by 6cm, and don’t depress the dough too much when making it.
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Place the oven tray or baking stone into the pre-heated oven and bake for 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 200°C and cook for a further 40min, or until your bread looks nicely browned and sounds hollow when tapped. Remove the Manchet Bread and leave to cool for an hour. Eat within 36 hours and keep the bread covered or in a bread tin.Although bread was a staple part of the Tudor diet in sixteenth-century England, imbued with religious symbolism, it was by no means a standard product. Its character, fabric and quality were governed by the local availability of different bread corns and the status of those who consumed it.
In Christian, and particularly Catholic, art Christ distributing bread to his disciples at the Last Supper is considered one of the most exalted subject. The highest form of bread for early modern painters was the risen bread, not the unleavened bread commanded by Moses, which Jesus would have eaten during Passover.
Contemporary sixteenth-century English dietary writer and physician, Thomas Moffett, believed that bread was absolutely necessary for healthy digestion. Without it, “all other meats (foods) would either quickly putrifie in our stomachs, or sooner pass through them than they should” and the result of this would be “crudities, belly-worms and fluxes”. Bread was also one of the few foods that was not assigned to a particular ‘humour’. This meant that it was suitable for everybody, being perfectly ‘tempered food”.
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For the elite and for large establishments, an external, well-staffed bakehouse was an absolute necessity as they wanted their bread baked daily. Nobles operated their bakehouses on a smaller scale and lesser households might employ a baker, but in most gentry, yeoman and peasant homes, breadmaking remained a female occupation carried out once a week.
Bread ovens were usually built into one wall of the bakehouse, with their flat floors about hip height above the ground. The interiors were dome or beehive shaped without any internal flues, and usually constructed of fireproof stone or brick.
. The large bread oven constructed onsite can be easily seen in the famous Field of Cloth of Gold painting, hung today at Hampton Court Palace.
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‘Faggots’, which were small diameter bundles of tied branches, served as fuel. They were burnt inside the oven and once the oven was hot enough, the embers were removed with an oven rake, while the fine ash was extracted with wet rags fastened to a long pole: the so-called “malkin”. The loaves were then inserted on a long-handled peel, the door set in place, its edges sealed with mud. When baked, the loaves were removed and put into breadbaskets called ‘maunds’.
Tudor bread loaves baked at home varied greatly in their composition and size, unlike the produce of commercial bakers, which were closely regulated by government-enforced by assize laws.
The bread most generally eaten underwent some change, at least in eastern and southern England, during the course of the fifteenth-century. This was almost certainly as a result of a long run of good harvests between 1440 and 1520. Contemporary writers sometimes bemoan the excessive expectations of labourers for better bread, which meant wheat-based bread, as part payment for their work.
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Bread was often crumbled into pottage to thicken it, or during the early Tudor period, laid on the table as a “trencher” (thick slice of bread serving as a plate or bowl) on which pottage and other food was heaped. Its density was an advantage in absorbing liquid.
Tudor bread can be classified into a few categories, the finest of all being the ‘manchet’ loaf. This was made
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