BAKERS’ DOZEN

The importance of every loaf being identifiable is easily understood, so a different mark (or ‘dock’), the Hallmark, was issued annually to each baker from Bakers’ Hall.

In order to avoid the dangers of short-weight, bakers often gave a small extra piece of bread, the ‘in-bread’, with each loaf and some of today’s older generation can still remember receiving these tasty morsels when buying a loaf. The custom arose likewise of bakers giving 13 loaves for every 12 bought, the extra one being termed the ‘vantage loaf’ and hence the ‘bakers’ dozen’.