Behind the scenes at Terra Breads

On Friday, I was lucky enough to be invited on a tour of Terra Breads bakery, led by Mary MacKay, Head Baker and Co-Owner of Terra Breads. To learn more about Mary and the passion she brings to baking, check out this video of her speaking at Food Talks. 



For those of you who don't live in Vancouver, Terra Breads is an artisan bakery that has grown to provide breads for many of our favourite local stores, in addition to their own bakeries and cafes. What is exciting about Terra is that, in this world where labels like 'artisan' and 'gourmet' and 'chef-inspired' are slapped on industrial slop daily, Terra Breads are still created using human hands. 

The food geek in me has a current fascination: living things and their role in creating the food we eat. Specifically, fermentation. I am not the only one...there is kombucha, kefir and sauerkraut on store shelves as far as the eye can see. So I was really excited when Mary started talking about the "mother": the sour culture that they have been using since the day Terra Breads was started. I even got to taste it. It is amazing how flour and water mingle with the resident yeasts and bacteria in the environment all around us take over and turn that mixture into something that will become an amazingly chewy, complex, flavourful loaf of bread. Mary noted that they only ferment at their main bakery because otherwise, the resident critters in each location would lend a totally different flavour to the breads. The Terra Breads flavour lives in East Van! 

We started our tour with this "mother" and followed it all the way through the ovens where the breads are baked directly on the stone. The bakery relies on some mechanization but mostly, human hands create the goodies you see on the shelves from good quality ingredients such as organic flour and freshly toasted nuts and seeds.

Bread is not a food I tend to eat a great deal of; however, if I am going to eat it...I am going to eat good bread. So when I given some bread to take home, it was time for an old-fashioned bread and cheese fest. In the best possible expression of that amazing duo.

Not-your-average Grilled Cheese

To perfectly recreate this sandwich, you need to use the right ingredients so I am going to tell you exactly what I used. Wonder bread and Kraft singles this ain't, folks!

2 slices of Terra Breads Fig and Anise Loaf (mine was a mini loaf!)
A few generous slices of organic, raw milk aged cheddar (I used L'Ancetre)
A slice or two of crisp, local apple
Organic butter for spreading (L'Ancetre again!)

Spread the outside of the sandwich slices with room-temperature butter and then layer the ingredients inside. Heat a non-stick pan to medium-high and place the sandwich in. Lower the heat to medium. When browned on one side, flip and cook the other side for about 2-3 minutes. Enjoy. 

PS... Terra Breads didn't know I was a blogger, I was invited as an educational opportunity because I work for Choices Markets. So this blog post was totally unsolicited and my own idea.

Eat...Freestyle Oatmeal Cookies

I had the overwhelming urge to bake tonight. Can't explain it really. I rarely bake except for the occasional muffin or holiday cookie. But tonight I wanted to fill my apartment with the sweet aroma of butter and sugar and I sure didn't want to have to buy any groceries. So I sifted through internet recipes for inspiration and then created this recipe based on the reality of my pantry. 


Feel like a cookie? Get baking....why "freestyle"? Because I threw these together as I do everything, haphazardly...and give you options to do the same.


Recipe. Freestyle Oatmeal Cookie


Place oven racks in top and bottom third of oven and preheat to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside.


1/2 cup organic butter 
1/2 cup natural unsweetened peanut butter (or your favourite natural nut butter)
1 1/2 cup loosely packed demerara sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 large organic eggs


2 1/2 cups old fashioned oats (get pure, uncontaminated oats for a "gluten free" recipe)
1 cup rice flour (brown or white)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp fine sea salt


2 1/2 cups of goodies* 
*I used half of very good bittersweet chocolate and half currants but any dried fruit, nut, chocolate combo would be awesome. Some suggestions: cranberry, pecan and milk chocolate; apricot, walnut, white chocolate; blueberry, almond, dark chocolate


In large bowl, cream together butters and sugar with wooden spoon or electric beaters then add vanilla and eggs and blend until fluffy. Then add next 4 ingredients and mix well by hand. Finally, add the goodies and mix in.


Drop by spoonful onto cookie sheets, a dozen per sheet. These will seem too loose, like they won't work...I was so sure they wouldn't but they come together really well in the oven. Place one sheet on top rack and one on the bottom rack and bake 7 minutes. Alternate rack position and bake 7 more minutes until golden brown.


Remove to a rack to cool and then bake the last 2 dozen cookies from remaining batter.


Enjoy!
Desiree 

Eat....Monster Cookies

Yum....here are my mother-in-law's Monster Cookies...photo taken with their Canon camera...still hoping I get a new one in my stocking!

It's almost Christmas and inevitably, we will all be eating some holiday treats, including me. (Yes, Virginia, dietitians do eat holiday treats!) Unfortunately, my little one, E, appears not to tolerate wheat in his breast milk so I have been eating fewer treats than I would normally enjoy over the holiday season. In my desire to have something festive to nibble on I have been making a ridiculous amount of Rice Krispie treats, even crafting a salted caramel variety, which I promise to share in a future post. Not the most thrilling of treats but a worthy substitute when everyone else is noshing.

My mother-in-law is a serious holiday baker. We are talking mountains of baking: one Christmas I assisted her for 8 hours straight of baking. So when my mother-in-law mentioned holiday baking and I sullenly replied...."but I can't eat wheat!" she triumphantly mentioned that her monster cookie recipe doesn't contain any flour. So of course I instantly thought - I need to share these with you!

Not for the dietetically faint of heart, these really are a monster of a cookie. Lots of eggs and good old fashioned sugar and fat for your holiday pleasure. However, they are not without their merits among lesser cookies. To their credit, monster cookies are 100% whole grain, contain a reasonable amount of protein and far less sugar then some other recipes. They are wheat free and can be gluten free if you ensure all your ingredients are gluten free, such as the chocolate chips. You could make these cookies dairy free with a switch of candies. And not that I would ever advocate cookies for breakfast but in a pinch one of these could keep you going if you have to scram out of the house because you still have Christmas presents to buy 5 days before Christmas (not that I am speaking from experience...). 

Recipe: Monster-in-Law (just kidding, I totally love my mother-in-law) Cookies

My mother-in-law got this recipe a couple of decades ago from a neighbour so I don't know if there is an original source I can attribute this recipe to....my apologies!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cream together the following ingredients in a really, really big bowl:

1 1/2 cups butter or vegan butter (3/4 pound)  Go for organic butter if you can afford it...
9 eggs Ditto on the organic eggs....
2 cups brown sugar
2 cups white sugar
2 1/4 lb peanut butter (just over one kilogram)
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp corn syrup
6 tsp baking soda

Then add the following to the creamed mixture and get your strongest armed family member to mix:

1/2 lb plain M&M candies
1/2 lb peanut M&M candies
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips
13 1/2 cups oatmeal (yes, not a typo....that is thirteen and a half cups of regular quick cooking oats, not instant and not thick or steel cut oats)

Once mixed, drop by spoonful (about 1/4 cup batter) onto cookie sheets and bake for 12 - 15 minutes.

The recipe makes 8 - 10 dozen snack/meal sized cookies, depending on how big you make them. Perfect for bake sales, gifts and fattening up relatives you don't like too much.

Merry Christmas,
Desiree

Eat...healthier muffins

Baked goods, especially the kind that you find in cafes and most supermarkets, are nutritional wolves in sheep's clothing: loaded with trans fats, hyperprocessed carbohydrates and way too much sugar. The average commercially baked muffin can top 400 calories and 20 grams of fat so next time you find yourself looking for a treat? Skip the muffin...if you are going to spend the calories anyways, you might as well have that donut or cookie!


But before you give them up entirely, muffins can be a super healthy and convenient snack or breakfast food when you make them yourself from wholesome ingredients. Muffins are so quick and easy to make...even for a novice baker. In less than an hour, you can have a fresh stock of on-the-go snacks (put half the batch in the freezer for later!).  Friday night I tried this Banana Muffin recipe created by Ann Barnes, author of Be a Better Being and co-owner of the company Mum's Original Hemp. Since the recipe wasn't featured on their website, I asked to share it on mine! 


If you like the recipe, Ann has lots of great recipes using hemp and Salba on her own site.


What makes these so healthy? First things first, by making 24 muffins you will be making muffins of an appropriate serving size...avoiding the giant carbo-load of cafe muffins. This recipe also uses whole wheat flour, higher in fibre and nutrients than white flour. Using bananas and yogurt allows for less fat in the recipe, while retaining an exceptionally moist texture. Finally, the start of the show is hemp hearts, loaded with anti-inflammatory omega 3 fatty acids and plant based protein. Hope you love the recipe!


Recipe


Mum's Banana Muffins
(shared with permission)


Ingredients


2 cups all purpose whole wheat flour
11/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
4 overripe bananas
1 cup brown sugar, lightly packed
1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted
1/3 cup plain yogurt
2 eggs
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup Mum's Original Organic Hemp Hearts


Method


1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit and lightly butter 2 muffin tins and set them aside.
2. In a large bowl combine flour, baking soda and salt and set aside.
3. Mash 2 of the bananas with a fork in a small bowl so they remain slightly lumpy.
4. In another bowl, whip last 2 bananas with sugar for 3 minutes with an electric hand mixer until smooth.
5. Add the melted butter, eggs, yogurt and vanilla to the banana sugar mixture and beat well, scraping sides of bowl once or twice.
6. Add wet ingredients to dry and mix until just incorporated taking care not to overmix (15-20 strokes is a good rule of thumb!).
7. Fold in hemp hearts and mashed bananas with a rubber spatula.
8. Spoon batter into muffin tins, filling halfway and rap tins on counter to remove air bubbles.
9. Sprinkle a few hemp hearts on top of muffins before baking 18 to 20 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let cool slightly before removing muffins from tins to cool completely.


Desiree's tip: if you like ginger, I added 1/2 cup of chopped crystallized ginger with the hemp hearts and banana! Chopped walnut would also be amazing...if you come up with any other additions that work well - please share!


In good health, 
Desiree