Ed and Natasha Tatton are co-owners of a vegan bread bakery called BReD in Whistler, British Columbia. They're also co-authors of BReD: Sourdough Loaves, Small Breads, and Other Plant-Based Baking, a cookbook that capitalized on the pandemic sourdough craze and actually got me measuring and mixing my own starter.
It's weird that I never thought about the fact that all bread was sourdough until about a hundred years ago, when commercial yeast was first mass produced.
The Wonder Bread of my youth (not that I got any -- thanks, Mom!) has very little to do with the long human tradition of breadmaking using the natural yeasts that float in the air all around us, and that sourdough bakers have been cultivating and using for millennia.
In our conversation, we talk about a bunch of things:
- entrepreneurship, and the challenges of starting a running a bakery
- why the Tattons opted to create a B-Corp
- the differences between sourdough and commercial bread
- what natural fermentation is and does
- a slow and mindful approach to breadmaking
- how making our own bread can change food culture (and perhaps culture in general)
- how to get started making sourdough bread
- and a lot more...
Links
BReD: Sourdough Loaves, Small Breads, and Other Plant-Based Baking
The Tatton's Instagram Account