The Gingerbread Gazette | ISSUE 1

What have we been getting up to during covid-19? get the kids baking! easy peasy gingerbread recipe inside

meet the founder!

The ultimate bitesize magazine for gingerbread lovers

issue 1 | June 2020

CONTENTS 03

FROM THE FOUNDER Get to know Hawkens Gingerbread from the Founder, Alastair himself

06

EASY GINGERBREAD RECIPE A quick, simple and scrumptious gingerbread recipe to tingle those tastebuds

07

FEEL GOOD NEWS What have Hawkens Gingerbread been getting up to during the COVID-19 lockdown?

05 OUR CUSTOMERS Showcasing feedback from our gingerbread lovers

☎ 01476 501740

✉ alastair@granthamgingerbread.com @hawkensgingerbread

The Gingerbread Bakery 28 London Road Grantham, Lincolnshire NG31 6EJ

FROM THE FOUNDER MORE ABOUT HAWKENS GINGERBREAD AND THE GINGERBREAD GAZETTE Tell us more about Hawkens Gingerbread...

Hawkens Gingerbread was really only created in 2015 when we moved into our current premises, a 4000sq ft converted Citadel. But I lay claim to the timeline that my foray in the world of gingerbread and thus the birth of Hawkens Gingerbread started further back in 2009. At the height of the recession in 2008/9 a new buzz word emerged. All 'crises' in our culture seem to generate a series of buzzwords. it's almost as if we need them to

understand what is going on and to apply a label to something.

A little bit like the words 'lockdown' and 'self-isolation;’’ they’ve become the buzzwords of the COVID-19 crisis. One of the buzzwords of the 2008/9 recession was to become 'austerity.' And the austerity label was quickly applied to many things, especially where services were being cut or taken away. 'Austerity' seems to quickly pass off a decision and give commentators little room for

argument. After all there was 'no money left'. Well in 2009, Lincolnshire County Council announced that Grantham Museum was going to close. This angered me. I rallied an emergency committee together of key figures in the local area and proposed to save the museum. My point was simple. That LCC would close the museum and if they did so it would never open again. We would have to convince LCC to hand over the keys and for the museum to be run by the community.

For this to succeed the museum would have to be income generating for the first time in its history and had to think like a business. And if the museum did nothing more than sell 1 packet of Grantham Gingerbread to just 50% of the visitors in 2008 then the museum would have £10K profit in the till for doing nothing more than exploiting and celebrating its local history.

Soon after making this point to the committee it dawned on me that Grantham no longer baked Grantham Gingerbread, England's oldest biscuit, first baked in the town as far back as 1740! As a Grantham chap born and raised I was personally aghast. I approached 2 local bakers who didn't accept the challenge to start baking the delicacy again. I was not a baker and certainly had no bakery nor a recipe of Grantham Gingerbread. But in the 200sq ft kitchen of my food business in the heart of Grantham I started baking what I believed to be Grantham Gingerbread.

Although I have been in the food industry since the year 2000 I also work to this day as a Broadcast Consultant for the BBC and ITV which could not be further removed from becoming a notable baker of some pretty amazing gingerbread products that we bake today. It is a tough challenge balancing my TV world with the phenomenal growth that I have enjoyed with Hawkens Gingerbread over the last few years. Only last week did I spend the night in Manchester broadcasting live BBC news to Saudi Arabia and Iran, before driving 160 miles back to Grantham to start baking for 9 hours.

It's not always that crazy but I take such moments as a mark of the success that our growth has achieved. We are now baking our glorious range of gingerbread in a 4000sq ft bakery which I have personally built from the floor up and have a production capacity of 80,000 retail products per month.

And we haven't even started yet!

What's in store for the future?

Our aim is to continue to bake premium quality gingerbread products that taste amazing. That is why I started Hawkens Gingerbread and that is what I love to do and continue to get a buzz from doing.

There is no greater job than when the bakery is in full swing and the sweet aroma of our gingerbread spice blends are lingering in the air. But it is not lost on me that the quality of gingerbread in the UK is pretty drastically poor and there are a lot of poor quality recipes representing this amazing history. So there is a real opportunity to build Hawkens Gingerbread to become the premium quality brand associated with gingerbread products in the UK. And then who knows?

Why the gingerbread gazette?

Gingerbread is one of the oldest foods on the planet. Amazingly the first recorded gingerbread recipe was baked in 2400BC in Western Greece. It really does have a truly global appeal that spans the globe.What really fascinates me about this product apart from its beautiful history is just how gingerbread has become so entrenched in so many cultures across the world but also so deeply woven into our lives and communities as well. We know that first hand in England when we consider age old recipes like Parkin that originates from Yorkshire and Lancashire, Grasmere Gingerbread, Cornish Fairings and of course our very own Grantham Gingerbread. Each town across our own country had its own gingerbread or gingerbread flavoured recipe. But that also applies across Europe. There is a beautiful recipe that originates from Dijon in south west France called Nonnettes which are little ginger cakes filled with marmalade and we all love Lebchuchen from Belgium and Germany.

And it is not just areas that have their own gingerbread variations. Families all over the world also have their own recipes. This appeal is what really fascinates me; it is like a gorgeous gingerbread thread that connects our

civilisations, our cultures, our histories, our countries, our communities, our families and our memories.

The Hawkens Gingerbread gazette will start building a global gingerbread community. I want to bring all of this gloriously tasty biscuit heritage together. I want our readers and gingerbread fans the world over to interact with each other and to share, through the gazette, their recipes that have brought fun and magical memories to their families.

What can we expect?

The Gingerbread gazette will become a place where recipes, stories, histories, facts and photos can be shared from all over the word. We have so many fans from across the globe and we want the Gazette to become bite sized quick read online publication where contribution from the readership helps to create each edition.

There is no better tea accompaniment than hawkens gingerbread!

ALICE | GINGERBREAD LOVER

SIMPLE GINGERBREAD RECIPE SOMETHING EASY TO TINGLE YOUR TASTEBUDS AND ONE FOR THE KIDS TOO!

Serves 15-20

INGREDIENTS 225g plain flour, plus extra for dusting ½ tsp salt 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda 1 heaped tsp ground ginger ½ tsp cinnamon 50g unsalted butter 100g soft brown sugar 100g golden syrup

method Heat the oven to 190/170 fan/gas5 and line a baking tray with baking parchment. Sieve the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and cinnamon into a large bowl.

Heat the butter, sugar and syrup until dissolved. Leave the sugar mixture to cool slightly, then mix into the dry ingredients from Step 1 to form a dough. Once completed, chill the dough in the fridge for 30 minutes.

On a surface, lightly dust with flour, roll out the dough to a ¼inch thickness. Stamp out the gingerbread men shapes with a cutter, then re-roll any off-cuts and repeat. Place your gingerbread shapes on the lined trays, allowing space for them to spread. Bake for 10-15 minutes, then remove from the oven and leave them to cool. (optional) Ice to your requirements/let the kids do their thing!

Make sure you share your creations with us using the hashtag #BakeWithHawkens for a chance to feature in our future bitesize magazines!

Ready, steady… BAKE!

FEEL GOOD NEWS IN A PERIOD OF UNCERTAINTY, WE DISCUSS WHAT HAWKENS GINGERBREAD HAVE BEEN GETTING UP TO DURING THE COVID-19 LOCKDOWN What we consider to be the “norm” has changed dramatically within the past two months; a national lockdown was announced towards the end of March and places were forced to shut down for the safety of the people. Covid-19 has been one of the biggest threats to society for decades, leaving us with no choice but to stay at home and to stay safe whilst protecting the most vulnerable and our key services, such as the healthcare sector. As a result we have experienced and are still experiencing a period of uncertainty; when will we hug our loved ones next; when will we sit around the dinner table enjoying Mum’s classic Sunday Roast; when will we take a walk in the park with our grandparents, holding their arms close to our hearts?

By understanding the real value of seeing our loved ones, Hawkens Gingerbread have spent most of the lockdown preparing and delivering Self Isolating and Key Workers Hampers - The Gift of Gingerbread, filled with an assortment of our scrumptious gingerbread and a personalised message of any length. These sweet and sentimental hampers have been enjoyed by hundreds across the nation; from Brighton to Birmingham, Lincolnshire to London and Nottingham to Norwich, our delicious delights accompanied by a heartfelt message have proven to be popular amongst many.

With each purchase a £5 donation is made to either Age UK or NHS Charities Together (depending on the chosen hamper), allowing the two charities to provide services to the most vulnerable. We have now raised £396 for Age UK and over £70 for NHS Charities Together, thanks to our customers and their kindness towards their close ones. Whilst many indulge in delectable bites of Hawkens Gingerbread’s artisan handmade biscuits, the two charities will continue to offer support for the services that some of our loved ones require. We know that the sum doesn’t compare to Captain Tom Moore’s efforts in fundraising, however we also know that every little does help and as a small, independent business, we are certainly proud of our ongoing donations to both Age UK and NHS Charities Together.

Thank you to all of our customers who have purchased The Gift of Gingerbread for their loved ones and key workers, we have enjoyed reading the sincere and beautiful messages that have accompanied the hampers. We’v e smiled, we’v e almost cried and we certainly cannot wait to do it all over again!

To give the Gift of Gingerbread, please visit: https://www.hawkensgingerbread.com/collections/g rantham-gingerbread-biscuits

A delicious bite for your tastebuds awaits...

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