The Sourdough School

Centre of Research & Education in Nutrition & Digestibility of Bread & the Gut Microbiome

Over 25 years ago Vanessa Kimbell recognised that that bread that we eat every day has a powerful, influence on our health. She pioneered an evidence-based approach, reframing the way we bake and eat bread as lifestyle medicine. The Sourdough School was founded to provide groundbreaking education, research and development programmes to support the baking and healthcare sectors.
Follow on Instagram

+44 (0)1604 881274
bookings@sourdough.co.uk
Follow on Instagram
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
Soil Association
Our sourdough starter and our gardens are certified organic by the Soil Association.
Navigation
  • Courses
    • Bake For Health Certificate
    • Diploma in Nutrition & Digestibility of Bread
    • Teaching Bread for Health Diploma
    • Request a Prospectus & Enquiries
    • Club Membership
    • Reviews
    • Information on Attending Our Workshops
    • My Bookings
  • The School
    • The Team
      • Guest Lectures & Contributors
    • Subscribe me to the Newsletter
    • Terms for The Sourdough School Ltd
  • Our Values
    • Our Systems Change Programme
    • A call to action
    • Seeded Solidarity Porridge Recipe
  • Learn
    • To Make Sourdough
    • Recipes
    • Bread & The Gut Microbiome
    • Bread & Nutrition
    • Health
    • Bread & Health
    • Sweet Sourdough Gut Microbiome Trial
    • Gallery
  • Students
    • My School Payments
    • Club Login
  • Shop
    • Books
    • Equipment
    • Ingredients

Gifts – a limited edition Botanical Blend for home millers £12.99

6 July 2020 by

Botanical Blend 

Needs to go with the MOCKMILL

  • Give the gift of gut health this Christmas with a beautiful bag of Botanical Blends – perfect for the health-conscious friend or loved one in your life…

Research suggests that we should be aiming to consume a diversity of 30 different ingredients each week. ( LINK TO RESEARCH ) 

Vanessa believes she can help us all do better than that. This has led to the creation of her world exclusive and innovative Botanical Blends. These are the world’s first bagged diversity blends available to bake with.

Using a Botanical Blend to create your bakes with, Vanessa’s aim was to get close to a score of 30 with just one bite.

Vanessa says: “Our great-grandfathers set about industrialising our food, systematically selecting specific grains, which they named and narrowed down. Without realising it, they destroyed and discarded the thing we need most: diversity.

“The research is irrefutable; diversity is one of the key factors affecting gut health. But achieving diversity in the current system is very complicated. The farmers and the millers are trapped within this system. But we can break out. The answer is to rethink flour and recreate this diversity by creating our own botanical blends. This simple act is a powerful and absolute rejection of monoculture.

“My botanical blends were inspired by standing in fields of grain and seeing a beautiful sea of colour and diversity. These blends reflect the way that these grains grew naturally, before agriculture. There are wild oats, brome grasses, cornflowers, poppies, fragrant herbs, such as oregano, and wild legumes, such as vetch and charlock (wild mustard seeds, known as ‘Poor Man’s Pepper’). Each plant has different biomolecules and this diversity is exactly what our own gut microbes need to thrive.”

In her book Sweet Baking, Vanessa includes recipes for consumers to create her diversity blends. But for those who do not have time Vanessa has created a very limited run of bags available for £x 

To get a Botanical Blend will be a special gift because there is only a limited run of these beautiful blends.

There are ten different blends available but the meadow blend is the base for all of the blends that can be be used to bake sourdough:

Base Blend Number 2 Meadow – this is the signature blend used at Vanessa’s famous Sourdough School.

Vanessa concludes: There is a worldwide established monocultural groove that we bakers are not obliged to follow. The system we work in is diametrically opposed to our understanding of the basic requirement for a healthy gut microbiome: the need for diversity. It is time to rethink flour. It is time to apply the findings of the research on what makes a healthy gut to our most basic of foods. It is time to change. It is time to reclaim diversity. It is time to stop being dictated to by an outdated industrialised system that we know is a contributing factor to reducing our gut microbial diversity and our health.”

All reasonable care is taken when writing about health aspects of bread, but the information it contains is not intended to take the place of treatment by a qualified medical practitioner. You must seek professional advice if you are in any doubt about any medical condition. Any application of the ideas and information contained on this website is at the reader's sole discretion and risk.

THE GENDER GAP IN HEART DIAGNOSIS
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
According to a report by the British Heart Foundation, more than 8,200 women died needlessly over a ten year period due to inequalities in the diagnosis and treatment of heart disease. Concerningly, women fare worse at every stage in their health journey for heart disease globally. 
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
DID YOU KNOW?
-	Women get half as much heart attack treatment as men 
-	Women are 50% more likely to receive a wrong initial diagnosis than their male counterpart, increasing the risk of death by as much as 70%
-	Women are less likey than men to recieve standard treatments such as bypass surgery
We can and must do better, starting by tackling the false- and deadly- assumption that women are not at risk of heart attacks. In reality, women are twice as likely to die from coronary heart disease than breast cancer.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
🌾Whole Grain Consumption And Heart Disease Protection
There is a robust body of evidence that suggests whole grains can protect against coronary heart disease, alongside obesity and colorectal cancer.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
❤️ According to a senior dietician at the British Heart Foundation: "Eating more whole grains is a simple change we can make to improve our diet and help lower our risk of heart and circulatory disease." Opting for wholemeal or granary in favour of refined white bread is a simple, effective way to increase your whole grain and fibre intake. #hearthealth #healthyheart #wholegrain #feedthecells #lifestylemedice #bake2give1 #wholegrainbread #internationalwomensday
A NEW APPROACH

👉🏻 For the past 3 years we’ve been working on something incredible … prescription sourdough bread making courses for our @sourdoughclub members 

📈We have had amazing advances in healthcare, but there is no pill to cure poor diet. The best medicine is prevention via a healthy lifestyle, and many studies have shown that people who eat healthily and exercise regularly sleep better, have less anxiety and depression, have more energy, and lower their risk of chronic illness overall.

🙌 Vanessa’s work on Bread & the Impact on the Gut Microbiome has been turned into something extraordinary. Prescription bread-making courses as a lifestyle intervention, and the Bread Protocol we teach here is designed to address the way you live, exploring behaviour related to nutrition, physical activity, stress management, sleep, social support and environmental exposures. These courses are 12 weeks long, and designed to maintain health and prevent disease not just in individuals bit in patients and populations, so we have 2 ways to enrol on a course: 

1️⃣ SOCIAL PRESCRIPTION 
If your doctor or healthcare practitioner is one of  our Sourdough School graduates and they feel that this bread-making prescription course is something that will improve your health, then they may can prescribe the course for you as a social prescription free.

2️⃣ SELF PRESCRIPTION 
You can self-prescribe these courses by enrolling yourself on a course to improve your health and wellbeing.

📰 If you are interested in learning more about the prescription courses then please sign up to the newsletters as we will be announcing their launch over the coming weeks and months. 

@vanessakimbell
@drmiguelmateas 
@dralexdavidson 
@dksherratt 

#lifestylemedicine #preventativemedicine #systemschange #socialprescribingday #socialprescribing
IN 2016 WE TESTED BLOOD SUGAR RESPONSE TO OUR PUMP IN 2016 WE TESTED BLOOD SUGAR RESPONSE TO OUR PUMPKIN SOURDOUGH IN THE  CLASSES

Our students measured their responses throughout the #breadandguts #sourdoughschool & @vanessakimbell wrote the recipe up in her bestselling Sourdough School book.

✨ So good to read that a recent 2021 study on Glycaemic and Appetite Suppression Effect of a Vegetable-Enriched Bread ( mentioned by @theguthealthdoctor today see last slide ) where researchers looked at the impacts of veg-enriched bread compared to  commercial white bread and commercial brown bread on the insulin levels of people participating. 

The results showed that when the participants ate the veg bread they reported feeling more satiation versus when they ate the white or brown bread. 

👆🏼They also experienced a lower insulin response with the vegetable bread. 
essentially translating this science into practice before it was trendy 😂👆🏼👍

This image is taken from the @sourdoughschool book by @vanessakimbell, produced by @kylebooksuk, with photography by @nassimarothacker, styled by @season_adam & with foreword by @richardhartbaker
DID YOU KNOW WE HAVE AN ONLINE SHOP & CAN PURCHASE DID YOU KNOW WE HAVE AN ONLINE SHOP & CAN PURCHASE MY WHITE SOURDOUGH STARTER?
(with worldwide delivery)
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
I have several sourdough starters but The French white starter is one that I have been using since I was 11 years old and originates in the bakery I grew up baking within France. It takes a bit longer to reach it’s peak and is generally slower and sweeter, and much more forgiving of being neglected for a week, so the one I recommend for beginners. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
We have verbal confirmation that the starter originated over 115 years ago and If you swipe right in the video you can listen to me chatting to one of the older residents of the village confirming that bakery did not shut during the war either .. & it has been maintained ever since... it’s a lovely story. Although the microbes double every 20 – 30 minutes when they are refreshed ... so it is either over a century old or 30 minutes old depending on how you want to look at it. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
You can purchase a pot of my starter, along with a grey moon kilner jar & a mini video course on looking after your starter. 
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
TAP THE PICTURE TO SHOP.
 
Swipe right to see the amazing video of the French bakery where the starter originated from @vanessakimbell has been baking with this starter for over 20 years … and first baked almost 40 years ago with it …#romantic 
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
#breadbosses #breadporn #flourwatersalt #breadtalk #bread #breadstagram #sourdough #sourdoughschool #bread #sourdoughlove #sourdoughlover #naturalleavened #leavening #levain #realbread #breadmaking #bakebread #makebread #makerealbread #learntobakebread #breadmakingclass #sourdoughstories #bakingforlove #bakingtherapy #sourdoughbaking #bannetons #bakery
UNDERSTANDING SOURDOUGH … starts, not in the bak UNDERSTANDING SOURDOUGH …
starts, not in the bakery, but in the soil.
#sourdough
Follow on Instagram
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

Email Sign Up:

Terms & Conditions | Competition Terms & Conditions | Privacy Policy
Copyright © 2022 Vanessa Kimbell | Login
Call +44 (0)1604 881274 - Email bookings@sourdough.co.uk
Registered in England and Wales: 08412236
Website by Callia Web