Malt loaf
Encyclopedia
Snack food
A snack is a portion of food oftentimes smaller than that of a regular meal, that is generally eaten between meals. Snacks come in a variety of forms including packaged and processed foods and items made from fresh ingredients at home....
in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. Malt loaf has a sweet taste and a very chewy texture like very heavy, soft bread
Bread
Bread is a staple food prepared by cooking a dough of flour and water and often additional ingredients. Doughs are usually baked, but in some cuisines breads are steamed , fried , or baked on an unoiled frying pan . It may be leavened or unleavened...
. It is made from malt
Malt
Malt is germinated cereal grains that have been dried in a process known as "malting". The grains are made to germinate by soaking in water, and are then halted from germinating further by drying with hot air...
and often contains fruit such as raisins. Malt loaf is usually eaten sliced and with butter.
History
In 1889, John Montgomerie of Scotland filed a U.S. patent application titled Making Malted Bread which was granted in 1890. This patent asserted a prior patent existed in England dated 1886. Montgomerie claimed a novel saccharification process which involved warming a portion of dough mixed with diastatic malt extract to an appropriate mashMashing
In brewing and distilling, mashing is the process of combining a mix of milled grain , known as the "grain bill", and water, known as "liquor", and heating this mixture...
temperature and holding it for a time so the extract's enzymes would pre-digest some of the starch.
Manufactured Malt loaves
Soreen (ˈ ) is a popular brand of malt loaf. The name is derived from 'Sorensen', the name of the family that once ran the company. In 2003 WarburtonsWarburtons
Warburtons is a British baking firm based founded by Thomas Warburton in 1876 in Bolton, then in Lancashire, now in Greater Manchester, England. For much of its history Warburtons only had bakeries in Lancashire and it remains a family-owned company....
sold the brand to Inter Link Foods and in 2007 Soreen became part of McCambridge Group. Aunt Ellen's is another popular brand. Both are produced in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
.
Harvo was another brand of malt loaf which was made in Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
up until the company went bankrupt in 1973. In some areas the name Harvo or Harvo Loaf is still often used to describe malt loaf regardless of the brand.