30
FOOD
The daily grind
Matthews Cotswold Flour is a centuries-old, familyrun mill which
has found itself in the middle of the
pandemic baking renaissance. No big surprise, the
various covid-19 induced
lockdowns lead to a
resurgence of homecooking
and baking. During lock
down one from March 2020, the BBC
Good Food website had its largest
influx of traffic ever, with 7.8m page
views in one day. The popularity of
bread-making recipes was up by
nearly 700%. A survey commissioned
by the National Association of British
and Irish Millers (NABIM) estimated
that no fewer than 27m Brits had
turned to baking. Many posted
pictures of their own fresh-baked
bread online on social media sites.
This was good news for one
West Country grain mill, Matthews
Cotswold Flour which understand
the difference between one grain
and another, and one type of flour
versus the next. With 22 different
products based on the grinding of
various grains. The Matthews family
has been milling at Shipton Under
Wychwood in the Evenlode Valley in
the Cotswolds for six generations,
where its mill has been grinding grain
for 113 years.
Silver linings
The resurgence of home-cooking
and baking brought on by the
national lockdowns lead to a third
of people who took part in aYouGov
survey said they'd bought at least
two bags of flour in the first month
of lockdown. More than a third
said they'd started making their
own bread. Bertie Matthews, who
is about to turn 30, recently took
over the reins as managing director.