Living La Vida Local

We haven't always been so fortunate as to bake with primarily local, organic ingredients.  We began our adventures educating ourselves about the importance of buying local foods for our family when we started baking for the St. James market several years ago.  Our relationships with customers, other vendors, friends and community members have informed our choice to go Local First.  For a long time, we've wanted to incorporate our personal purchasing practices into the bakery, but the availability of steady cash flow to live up to our ideals has always been a concern.

Starting our Community Supported Bakery has helped solve the issue.  We currently have 58 members, most of whom research and understand where their food comes from.  We happily publish our suppliers.  We strive for organic, but also use ingredients that are produced under organic, certified naturally grown & fair trade practices.

Here are some local businesses we partner with: 

Champlain Valley Milling in Westport NY: Organic Flours, some Local/Certified Naturally Grown
Meadowbrook Farms in Clarksville, NY: rGBH-free Milk, Buttermilk, half & half, cream and we are very excited to begin receiving LOCAL BUTTER from them as well (as available).  There is a buttery in Conestoga that supplies Meadowbrook, we're learning more about them. As a back-up, we use the unsalted European butter from the Honest Weight or Organic Valley.
Adirondack Farm in Fonda, NY: Organic Maple Syrup
Once Again Nut Butters, Nunda, NY - Peanut Butter (fair trade)
Eggs come from a local farm (either Otter Hook or Raven's Roost Farms, both in New Baltimore, or Meadowbrook/others depending on availability).  Eggs will always be free-range and organic or produced under organic practices.  Otter Hook & Raven's Roost use organic practices and their chickens are totally free-range.  OH also has a wonderful CSA & RR spins wool into amazing creations and produces high-quality lamb.
WestSoy: Organic Unsweetened Soymilk
Wholesome Sweeteners: Organic, Fair Trade Sugar from Paraguay
Spices & Yeast - Mike's Spice, Honest Weight Food Coop

Community Supported Bakery Shares are still available on a pro-rated basis through April 27, beginning at only $6.00 per week.  Please visit our website for more information about shares and links to our suppliers!

Your bakers,

Britin & Nick

The Muffin (Wo)Man

Since starting the CSB in November, Nick has had a lot on his plate.  He usually prepares all the bread, scones, croissants, bialys, and until recently, muffins for the CSB & the market.  I (Britin) take care of the business end of things and prepare vegan cinnamon buns, crispy brown rice energy treats, cakes and (not least) croutons.  To take a little pressure off of Nick and stretch my creativity a bit, I've recently taken over the muffins.

Although eating baked goods typically translates into consuming lots of calories, we bake with the healthiest, real ingredients we can find so everything still has substantial nutritional value (and tastes good).  Our family has become progressively more health conscience and we know many others who are looking to add a variety of healthy grains to their diets, so we're no longer using unbleached white flour in our muffins.  I've been having fun experimenting with hearty combinations, sometimes with a bit of indulgence thrown in.  I'm using whole grain flours and aiming to sweeten most with local organic maple syrup (from Adirondack Maple Farms).  Here's what we've come up with so far!

• Sunflower Millet - Made with whole wheat & spelt flours, organic raw millet, locally roasted  unsalted organic sunflower seeds, cinnamon (from Mike's Spice) and sweetened only with maple syrup, these muffins are surprisingly good and good for you.  The crunchy millet and sweet sunflower seeds (inside and on top) make for a nice mix of textures, the cinnamon adds balance to the overall flavor.
• Maple Sunrise - A meal unto itself, one of these will carry you from very early morning to a late lunch.  Made with spelt flour (and a bit of organic quick oats), locally grown organic carrots & apples, organic raisins, coconut and walnuts, cinnamon, sweetened with maple syrup.
• Banana Oat Nut Chip - This is a muffin that has been tried by many, but absent white flour and filled with wholesome ingredients, it becomes one you can feel good about offering to your kids.  We make them with whole wheat flour, organic oat bran and quick oats, organic bananas, walnuts, cinnamon and just a few vegan dark chocolate chips thrown in, sweetened with maple syrup. 

Although we can't get berries locally this time of year, they're a holiday favorite.  We get our organic berries from the Honest Weight.  Here are a couple of winter combinations we've created:

• Double Chocolate Raspberry Espresso - With fair trade cocoa and Green & Black's fair-trade organic Dark Chocolate Espresso Bar, our Raspberry Espresso muffin is a treat, but still good for you.  We make it with whole wheat flour (and a bit of spelt) and organic oat bran.

• White Chocolate Cranberry - The closest we'll get to a "white" muffin, this one is made with spelt flour and a tiny bit of whole wheat, fresh cranberries and white chocolate (Green & Black's), and is drizzled with vanilla buttercream icing.  With the berries cut in half and closely shaven chunks of white chocolate, the perfect tart and sweet combination is created.  I couldn't resist devouring two right away (for quality control purposes, of course).

All of our muffins are made with local organic (or organic-practices), free-range eggs and just this week we started baking with local rGBH-free butter, from Meadowbrook Farms!  The milk and buttermilk also come from Meadowbrook. All of our flours are locally-milled and organic (from Champlain Valley Mills). You can special order a batch (9 for $24) by emailing us at allgoodbakers@gmail.com.

We'll have more stories behind our recipes and updates on our plans coming soon.  Stay tuned.

Your bakers,
Britin & Nick