Lithuanians associate the word bread only with black rye bread. They love it and miss it, where they can’t get it.
Since the old days rye has been the most widely cultivated of grains in Lithuania, offering plenty of harvest and thus no household could do without black rye bread. Moreover, dark rye bread is a traditional Lithuanian benchmark for baked goods, not only characterised by an excellent taste, but also very beneficial. Lithuanians used to bake different kinds of bread too, which eventually changed their shapes and tastes, while dark rye bread, passed down with knowledge and experience from generations to generations remained the same, completely unchanged. Aside from leavened bread, Lithuanian kitchen was familiar with various unsweetened bread products too — the so called wholemeal bread — made of coarsely ground sieved rye, wheat or barley flour.
Our goal is to preserve the true quality and taste of Lithuanian dark rye bread and wholemeal bread for not only our grandchildren, but also their children and foreign guests.
Rūgpienių kaimo bread, wholemeal bread, crunchy sticks and other baked goodies are made according to authentic recipes, inherited from our ancestors. Fulfilling our promise to love and respect bread, we do our best to offer our consumers the highest quality natural baked goods. Rūgpienių kaimo bread is baked only from carefully selected products: our own ground wholemeal rye and wheat flour, leaven, honey, salt, water and caraway. We bake our goods from wholemeal grain, bran, butter, eggs and other organic products. Handmade with love — this is how we ensure highest quality and authenticity.
The average amount of bread consumed by one person is 150-500 g every day (~300 g in Lithuania). This is one of the most important food products, meeting the majority of the body’s energy needs. Rye and wheat bread (wholemeal bread) contains all of the most important nutrients: 5-8 % protein, 40-50 % carbohydrates, minerals (calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, potassium salt), vitamins E and B. The energy value of dark rye bread is 190-220 kcal / 100 g, wholemeal bread — 180 kcal / 100 g. Rūgpienių kaimo baked goods from coarse wholemeal flour, containing a lot of bran, are useful for the fibre, which stimulates gastrointestinal activity. (Bran should not be confused with chaff, the protective casings separated from grain, mostly constituted of cellulose and thus unsuitable for food.) Bran is rich with omega-3 fatty acids, starch, protein, vitamins and minerals.
After a long way of trial and error we are happy to finally have found reliable grain suppliers and grasped the subtleties of our ancestors’ recipes. In the age of technology and abundance we are proud to be able to offer simple rye bred, which does not include:
- potato and corn flakes (our bread is filling and moist enough without them);
- acidity regulators (the natural leaven takes care of this for us);
- preservatives or antioxidants;
- sugar (we use natural honey to make our bread pleasantly sweet and sour);
- highest quality flour, which is extra pure, yet contains little fibre, minerals and vitamins;
- malt (our bread is rich in colour and flavour without it);
- wheat (this is rye bread, isn’t it?)
- or yeast (also perfectly taken care of by the natural leaven).
