Well what a week we’ve had at Priors Flour HQ! We had planned to spend three days dressing (sharpening) the millstones on our electricity powered Hurst Frame and installing a new auger system to enable us to move grain and meal (flour) up the mill. I am pleased to say, that has all gone well. Then what we did not expect – preparation for Storm Eunice which is howling around me as I write this post.

So far, so good (at least from what I can see) on the storm front, although this has certainly been a punishing few hours for our 165 year old mill. Fingers crossed, there is no damage after the 75mph gusts which are we are experiencing.

Lifting millstones requires great care, attention and focus on safety. Below, you can see how we lift the millstones using chain blocks, a lifting gantry and lifting strops.

You can see the “runner stone” (closest to the camera) which is the top millstone – this has been lifted off the “bed stone” (see behind) and then turned over to expose the grinding surface. The grooves (called “Furrows”) are then deepened (these days we use an angle grinder with a special tool) and the grinding surface flattened before the “stitching” is applied by hand using a mill bill and thrift. This roughens up the grinding surface which then works more efficiently. The diagram below shows this:

The “Furrows” have an interesting naming history. The longest furrow is called the “Master Furrow”, the next longest is called the “Journeyman Furrow”, the next longest – the “Apprentice Furrow”. Why? The Miller or Master Stone Dresser would set the Master, then hand over to the Journeyman, then the Apprentice and so on! Spreading the labour – it was hard work.

What’s the impact now the stones are dressed? We can mill faster and still produce a quality meal whilst creating less heat – which further maintains the baking qualities of the flour! Thanks to our millwright, Malcolm Cooper for his help this week.

In addition to our flour milling, packing and dispatching, the last week has been filled with the joys(!) of migrating our online shop from Selz to WooCommerce (eCommerce providers). We have had to make this change due to the partnership between Selz and Zettle (our Electronic Point of Sales provider) coming to an end.

Our new shop pages look like the following:

We hope you will agree that this is a positive change in that the pages are clearer and easier to navigate. We still have some images to add for the different products and a few jobs to tidy up the interface and ensure everything fits our ‘house style’, however, the site is now working and ‘live’! You will still find the same categories:

For each product, instead of three buttons to choose the size of product, you will find one drop-down menu offering you all our product sizes.

The check-out process is clearer AND you can now more easily tick the box to ‘click & collect’ – to pick up your flour from the mill if you so choose.

Shipping is now calculated more accurately by weight of your shopping cart than was possible before. As before, shipping is correct for all UK mainland customers. Customers whose addresses are “Highlands and Islands” will be contacted following your order to re-confirm the shipping costs as these have to be calculated on a case by case basis and are typically more expensive than the standard rates we have agreed with our courier, UK Mail.

We are grateful for any feedback you have, so please share it with us using the contact page

Now that Christmas with its feast of treats and tastes is but a distant memory and your ‘dry January’ or ‘Veganuary’ is wearing thin, how about introducing a bit of healthy luxury into your breakfast, lunch or tea with a slice of Dark Malt bread? For the avoidance of doubt, the bread bears no resemblance to the Malt Loaf many of you learned about on the BBC programme Inside the Factory which we featured on. By the way, thanks for all the kind comments – we thought the mill showed itself well and were very pleased with the results!

Inspired by our Dutch friends at The Friendship Mill in Weesp, The Netherlands, we blend a number of flours, seeds and malt products to create a dark, malty flour filled with goodness and depth of taste, but equally producing a light aerated crumb (as you can see below).

The dark colour of the crumb is a lovely surprise and it makes toast to die for… you will be reaching for the smoked salmon or lathering it with Nutella – it works well with both sweet and savory toppings; we hope not on the same piece of toast!

You can find Dark Malt Flour here – down towards the bottom of the page.

Happy New Year to all our customers, friends and supporters. We hope you were able to make the best of Christmas given all that has been going on and, like us, managed to get a good rest! We are now back and preparing to get our noses (as it were..) to the grindstones, gearing up for what we hope will be another successful year bringing you best quality flours. We have lots of plans which you will hear more of as the weeks progress.

Our mail order service is now open again if you need to stock up and the mill shop will be open on Thursday 6th January from 9am to 1pm and again on Sunday 9th January from 2pm to 5pm. We are then back to our usual opening times .

Another piece of exciting news is that Fosters Mill (where we produce the Prior’s Flour) features on Inside the Factory – “Malt Loaf” this week.

Ruth Goodman, the presenter for the part of the show we feature in came to the mill in the autumn of 2020 to explore the reasons why traditional stoneground milling gave way to roller milling at the end of the 19th Century as the later Victorians demand for white flour increased exponentially.

We had a great day with Ruth and the production team, filming as we did in the depths of Covid, precautions and all. We have no idea what will be shown in the programme, but we’re looking forward to finding out!

Our apologies for adding to your inbox for a second time in a week, however, we hope that our update on progress at Swaffham Prior Smock Mill will make it worthwhile!

Christmas Opening Times Correction

Those with a nose for detail might have spotted that our previous message contained a typo! Our final shop opening day is Thursday 16th December, not the 17th as previously advertised.

Smock Tower Update

Our neighbour James Forsyth has been making great progress at the Smock Tower. We share below some recent photos of work to the new mill cap and the Smock Tower itself.

Work has also progressed on trimming back vegetation around the mill to ensure that when the sails are returned in 2022, the mill is able to take full advantage of the available wind from all directions. The decision to withdraw proposals to build on land close to the mill a few years ago has certainly been validated given the future wind requirements of the Smock Tower Mill and the fact that the views of the two mills working (The Smock Tower and Fosters Mill) will be unique to the UK. Swaffham Prior will be firmly put on the map as a centre of traditional windmills attracting numbers of visitors who will come to view both mills working at the same time – the only place in the UK where this is possible with two working mills in such close proximity.

The new Mill Cap

The structure of the Cap is now complete and the windshaft and brake wheel have now been fitted at the International Boat Building College at Lowestoft. See below:

Work to the Smock Tower

With progress now advanced with the mill cap, James is turning his attention to the smock tower itself. The tower needs to be re-boarded and the timbers adjusted to ensure that the curb (the part the cap sits on) is level. So, an impressive scaffolding tower has now been erected to protect the tower (part of James’s house!) whilst the works take place:

Congratulations to James and his family for their continued efforts to return the mill to working order! We are so looking forward to seeing both mills working together.