25/08/2026
All grains carry the landscape they came from.
Given time to naturally leaven and slowly proof, a grain has the chance to become what it can be,rather than being made to fit the timetable of industrial breadmaking.
Rye makes this particularly visible.
Across northern and eastern Europe, rye became an essential bread grain, well suited to colder conditions and shorter growing seasons. One of the rye traditions we keep coming back to is Finnish rye.
In the region we now know as Finland, rye has been part of bread culture for around 2,000 years. Wholegrain rye, long fermentation and pronounced acidity became fundamental to the bread. A substantial proportion of the rye itself is fermented, developing both the structure and character of the final loaf.
The sourdough culture at the heart of traditional Finnish rye is known as juuri root or leivän juuri, the root of the bread.
Not an addition to the bread. Its root.
In 2017, the year Finland marked 100 years of independence, rye bread was voted the country’s national food.
Our Finnish Rye draws from that tradition: made with organic stone ground wholegrain rye grown by Milmoredowns in Canterbury, naturally leavened and given the time to become entirely itself.
Finnish Rye.
A culture of sourdough
