Why is there no flour?

[Broadback]

seems are rare as rocking horse sh*t, why?

[Andy Burns]

Wouldn't say it's back to normal yet, but have seen plain/wholemeal/self-raising in sainsburys, eight different varies on the shelf in waitrose, and small bags obviously portioned-out from industrial sacks in morrisons and asda ... try shopping at different times?

[Tricky Dicky]

Same here. A while back they were saying there was flour but no bags to put it in, you would have thought they would have solved that by now. SWAMBO tells me she has managed to get a 1.5 Kg bag for £6 on Amazon. Don?t know if that is expensive?

Richard

[Andy Burns]

very.

Dad can't go out to buy, and supermarket deliveries didn't deliver him any (probably because he ticks the "no substitutes" box) he has started buying mail-order bulk

[Jeff Layman]

Yesterday, in a big Sainsburys, there were plenty of bags of their own-brand plain and self-raising flour. It's the first time I've seen it there for weeks. Oh, I forgot to mention these were, IIRC, 12kg bags! :-)

[polygonum_on_google]

Round here Lidl, Aldi, Tesco, health food shop - all have flour. Sometimes quite a range.

Wholemeal bread, white bread, white ordinary, self-raising, spelt, rye, organic, gluten-free in numerous varieties, and others.

Might not have all of them, every day, but plenty around. Just cooked my latest loaf this morning. 50:50 wholemeal and white. Divided dough in three. Added lots of mixed herbs to one piece, grand padano to another and left one plain. Shaped each one into a small loaf. Placed herb at one end, cheese at the other and plain in the middle. When they proved, the three parts just about welded to each other to make one loaf.

[TimW]

There has been no flour shortage as such, eg there is always bread on the shelves, but I am told a lack of capacity to pack and distribute it in consumer sized bags.

TW

[Bob Eager]

Indeed. I bought a 16kg bag by mail order.

[Chris Hogg]

Agreed, flour is scarce but not unobtainable. But yeast is impossible to find, it seems. Plenty on Ebay or Amazon, but mostly from China, and I'm not sure I want that.

[Martin Brown]

It was.

But this week Tescos even had recognisable brands like Homepride and Bero. Recent weeks it had been anonymous brown paper bags with decanted catering grade bulk flower in and inkjet printed labels. The latter still made up the bulk of what was on offer but things are better now.

It was only absent for a couple of weeks round here before pubs and restaurants started selling their bulk stock to the village shop.

[Tim Streater]

I was lucky enough to find some in Tesco's recently.

[Tim Streater]

Still no Alinson's strong white flour which is what we tend to get.

[Ophelia]

Wouldn't say it's back to normal yet, but have seen plain/wholemeal/self-raising in sainsburys, eight different varies on the shelf in waitrose, and small bags obviously portioned-out from industrial sacks in morrisons and asda ... try shopping at different times?

==

I was in ASDA in Elgin today.

There was the usual Plain, SR and some bags filled in store!

They were labelled 'baking flour'! I didn't have a clue what that was supposed to be.

[Ophelia]

It was.

But this week Tescos even had recognisable brands like Homepride and Bero. Recent weeks it had been anonymous brown paper bags with decanted catering grade bulk flower in and inkjet printed labels. The latter still made up the bulk of what was on offer but things are better now.

It was only absent for a couple of weeks round here before pubs and restaurants started selling their bulk stock to the village shop.

Regards, Martin Brown

===

The only flour I can't get up here is Bread Flour!

[Ophelia]

Still no Alinson's strong white flour which is what we tend to get.

Tim

==

Yes that is what I need!

[DJC]

Most flour is sold to the catering trade. So plenty of flour in catering sizes but not in retail sizes.

[Brian Gaff (Sofa)]

Maybe everyone has stock piled it. Brian

[John Rumm]

Because of all the flour sold in the UK normally, about 2% of it is sold through retail. The rest sold in bulk to commercial food manufacturers and the catering trade. I think I read that the average consumption per household is about 1 bag every six weeks or so.

That was before everyone was sat at home trying to do some baking or bread making!

(now the wholesalers are trying to work out how to get bulk flour into the retail channels)

[Dave W]

My Waitrose had the first yeast I'd seen since lockdown last week (but no flour). Two days later it had gone.

[tim...]

in what sense do you mean obviously here