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.
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Soil Association
Our sourdough starter and our gardens are certified organic by the Soil Association.
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The Gardens at The Sourdough School are Certified Organic

organic garden

The Sourdough School gardens

In the gardens at The Sourdough School, we have a kitchen garden and a fruit garden. These walled gardens are set in rural Northamptonshire in the home of Vanessa Kimbell, covering two-thirds of an acre. These beautiful Victorian walled gardens are now in their eleventh year. We are deeply proud that we’ve been certified organic here for about seven years.

There are examples of wheat from our population programme growing in the garden. We grow all our own botanicals, including the roses, all the botanical flowers and petals we put in, as well as the organic herbs. We have our own organic chickens, and try to grown all our salads and some vegetables that we include in the lunches here at the school. Our fruit bushes are used to make our jams for the compotes with their high polyphenols. All of the principles around the bread protocol and eating symbiotically, wherever possible, we produce in our gardens.

It starts with the soil…

Looking at the current approach to breadmaking globally, it’s flawed on so many levels. Here at The Sourdough School, we had to stand back from the system. We had to reimagine how our bread could be created according to our guiding principle of making bread that nourishes. The starting point isn’t with the bread itself – it’s with the soil and the soil systems. This includes the way in which our breadmaking ingredients are sourced according to our protocol.

You might say that we’re environmentalists on a macro and micro level because not only have we considered the macro environment – the soil systems, the agricultural systems, the way in which we produce the diversity breads and the way that we teach here at The Sourdough School – but we’re also micro-environmentalists, which is our microbiome. I’m an environmentalist at both macro and micro scale.

The true cost of organic food

Being organic is fundamental to the practice of our values here at The Sourdough School. I’m not saying this is an easy thing to do (it’s not!) and over many years it has been suggested to me that it is not a viable way of looking at breadmaking. It certainly makes it unaffordable for many people who are struggling to make ends meet to afford organically-produced ingredients. But lack of affordability distracts from the true cost of using pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and ‘baking improvers’. This includes some very unpleasant chemical cocktails.

Throughout the research here, we’ve seen this adds up to a compromise on your gut microbiome, on our environment and on diversity. There are huge conglomerates that grow grain on an unimaginable scale and our entire food system is reliant on the petrochemical industry, which is completely unsustainable. When you dismiss the health concerns of the carcinogenic and gut microbial damaging aspects of conventional agriculture and breadmaking processes, and then when you dismiss concerns of the impact on our environment, you cannot dismiss the fact that this is an unsustainable practice for long-term global food security.

We really have to look beyond the financial cost of organic

While I appreciate that I’ve been told this unrealistic, I believe that systems change and understanding is actually possible. We have created examples of how this is possible through our partnerships and our own certification here at the school. We have to be pragmatic about our approach to bread and there are always compromises. I think it’s important, whenever there is decision making or whenever there is the possibility of practising organic principles, to do that at part of our value system.

Read more about our systems change programme

THE GENDER GAP IN HEART DIAGNOSIS
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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. 
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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.
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🌾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.
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❤️ 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)
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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. 
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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 
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#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
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