Award winning Northern Ireland bakery targets growth through healthy innovation
Ann's Pantry, Northern Ireland's award winning bakery, is focusing on health through the development of new products, including an innovative Christmas Pudding, from spelt flour.
The artisan business, the only bakery in the UK and Ireland to reach the final round of this year's UK Great Taste Awards, has already used spelt flour in the production of the first three products in a range being planned by the team of five bakers under the leadership of John Agnew.
Mr Agnew has been baking there for almost two decades and has been managing the family business for the past three years.
He aims to see the bakery, originally started by his parents in 1967 and named after Ann, his mother, expand sales in markets outside Northern Ireland and has set its sights on winning its first business in the Irish Republic soon.
The new products from spelt flour are Madeira Cake, rich Fruit Loaf and Christmas pudding and carry forward the outstanding achievements of the company in the Great Taste Awards, which saw it gain top awards for its traditional Irish breads including two using spelt flour - white soda spelt farl and spelt meal oven soda.
In addition, the company gained awards for its unique Guinness oven wheaten, low GI multi-seed bread, among the most popular with customers, and also for a chicken and leek pie.
"Health is now a major issue for all food companies including bakeries, and we've found a number of our products such as the low GI multi-seed and spelt flour breads becoming increasingly popular with customers," Mr Agnew says.
"Spelt flour breads are highly regarded by health conscious consumers because they are wheat-free and low in salt. This trend, together with the success of our spelt breads in the Great Taste Awards, has encouraged us to focus on developing a range of breads and cakes using spelt flour.
"Spelt has a host of nutrients and is an excellent source, for example of vitamin B2, as well as magnesium niacin, thiamine, zinc and copper. It is also regarded as a good source of dietary fibre. Research suggests that spelt may help in controlling blood sugar and cholesterol and also in some addressing cardiac conditions.
"We've been winning awards steadily over the past few years, awards which have endorsed the quality of our products and our expertise. They also show that our products are competitive and innovative.
"What I want to do is to build on this solid platform and set the business apart through the production of bread and cakes especially for health conscious consumers," he adds.