A Reflection on 5 Years and Cake!
Ciao Gluten-Free Sourdough Bread fans, it is late summer and it is time to check in!
First some Announcements:
Buckwheat Cake is back this week! This time with local Asian Pears—a late summer treat.
Seeded Sourdough is coming back! Find it on an every-other week rotation with Coriander Raisin (this Wednesday Sept 6th is a Coriander Raisin week)
We are traveling the first half of October. This means no markets or pickups on Oct 4th and Oct 11th.
We were looking through some photos recently and found this gem.
Back in November 2018 our first market appearance was at the Fermentation Fest in Marshall NC. It was the first time we actually said “Let’s see if fresh-milled, gluten-free sourdough is something that people really want to buy and if it will go beyond a hobby”. If you look closely there’s no bread on the table—it was an almost immediate sell-out and caused us to say, “Wow, people DO want to buy our bread!”
Five long years later, selling bread at market is an every week event and we have a steady, loyal customer base we didn’t dream of back then. A few of you found us there at the Fermentation Fest and you continue to be faithful customers. Thank you!
A few highlights from the last 5 years:
Hearing from you about why Bread (GF in this case) is so important to your life, we are honored to provide it for your tables. We continue to hear:
This bread provides steady energy and quick meals that you can’t replace with other foods.
It’s a trusted daily and weekly staple for you and your family.
With roads choked and stores bustling, it’s hard to remember delivering bread to your doorsteps around Asheville during the high-COVID years.
The years of empty roads, quietness, questions, anxiety, long hikes, and outdoor camaraderie.
Those were important years. All of us were part of a mass global moment and its memories and lessons should not be erased.
Baking up amazing pizzas at outdoor pop-ups.
Beth and I had never gone through the agony and thrill of serving a brewery full of hungry customers in real-time.
Being “in the weeds” and selling 50 pizzas in a just a few hours is unforgettable.
Inventing new bread recipes that soon gathered committed fans. It’s been great taking good ingredients and grains, and working them into breads, focaccias, cakes and cookies.
Today, back at the Asheville RAD Market with the French Broad river as backdrop, we love to see your faces, meet new customers and hear your stories each week!
The Path from Here:
Honestly, who knows? As hot summer turns into warm fall we are still baking for you—don’t worry, this is not a farewell email! Even five years later here in the “foodie-capital” of Asheville there are still not many healthy, reliable and tasty GF breads out there. We hear this from you all the time and we experience it ourselves as we eat out and request gluten-free. Healthy food prepared with real ingredients and eaten fresh are so important but still hard to find; it requires lots of work and a commitment to invest in what’s important for our collective health and the health of our planet.
Count on our commitment to continue the current path and as we do, to seek ways to join forces with others in the region interested in doing the same.
One more note…
While we will continue to bake through September, we’ll be taking a short break the first two weeks of October. Our itinerary includes Lago D’Orta in Italy and a continued search for creative GF cuisine in Milano, Torino and Madrid. Look for us again at market the third week of October!
Ciao a tutte e tutti
Flavio and Beth for Urban Peasants