The Bread Workshop

breadworkshop — Tue, 15 May 2012 20:51:04 +0000

“All great changes are preceded by chaos.” -Deepak Chopra

Hi Bread Workshop fans,
Many have come in excited by the new grab and go salads, soups and our the limited sandwich menu prepared by our wonderful counter crew. As I said in the last posting, we have discontinued the sandwich and hot food menu that has been part of our life for 8 years. We are taking a bit of time to regroup and figure out the next steps.Lourdes, who’s been working for us for 20 years, is helping us make an assortment of salads, sandwiches and soups. Meanwhile Sophie and Katherine have been expanding their pastry range with some savory items like quiche and savory bread pudding. We will continue to make more grab and go items like baked green chile chicken empanadas. We are dedicated to make food that comes from our hearts, using our training and skill. This means that quality, not quantity is going to be our focus.
Using the best freshest ingredients we can will allow us to make a variety foods from many cultures and backgrounds. We will also to create healthy nutritious items for many diets, though we hope they will be tasty enough for everybody.
As with all transitions, this may take a little time to perfect. I assure you our focus will be on the food at all times. I will keep posting our progress as we go, introducing new products. For example, our pastry department, Sophie and Katherine, have just introduced gluten free coconut macaroons. To track of all this we will not only post these on our website but on our Facebook page or just come in and see what we are up to.

Thank you for your dedication and patience.

With a heavy heart we are discontinuing lunch and dinner as we know it

breadworkshop — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 19:03:04 +0000

For the past 8 years we have been providing moderately priced food based on mainly sustainable products. During this time we have learned a lot, but more importantly we have shared this knowledge with our customers as well as our vendors. We believe that, though small, we have had a voice in the sustainable movement. We’ve included in this sustainable packaging as well, constantly helping our vendors find and distribute sustainable products. We have appreciated all the support that you have given our efforts.
It is with heavy heart that I must declare our attempts to provide this at an end. Though we are going to continue selling coffee, bread, pastry, drinks and catering, we must end our hot food production due to rising food and packaging cost’s and a general change in market forces. We may still have some lunch items available, but for the moment they are going to be limited to soups, salads and a few deli style items. This change, like all changes, will hopefully enable us to become more sustainable as a business and, with any luck after a bit of soul searching, will enable us to find a new voice in the land of sustainability. In other words, we may come back with a more viable concept later, but for now we need to lick our wounds and regroup. So as of May 1rst we are going to discontinue our lunch, dinner and brunch menu. As I said before we are still going to continue run our café with coffee, bread, drinks, soups and some salads, and will explore other possibilities in the future as well.

Thanks you for your continued support and patronage!

Diestel Turkey Burgers have arrived

breadworkshop — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 16:35:27 +0000

The sad news is that our buffalo burger has left our menu due to increased popularity of buffalo (weird reason, huh? see why below). The good news is that we are now getting some delicious ground turkey from Diestel Ranch seasoned with organic sage, sauteed onions and garlic. This is now available on any of our popular burger combination’s.

This change represents one of the struggles which we are constantly looking at, that is to provide reasonably priced sustainable foods. The popularity of buffalo in supermarkets, which fetches better prices for the supplier than restaurants, increased our price for buffalo to such an extent that we could no longer afford to sell it at our goal of sustainable products for under $10 (our regular menu goal, though some daily specials are higher). I don’t blame the supplier and am glad that buffalo is getting so popular, but the best thing is that it led us to another delicious alternative.

For all those buffalo (OK, it’s really North American bison) fans it is still a great meat to eat, environmentally as well as for health concerns! But we, at The Bread Workshop, are trying to focus on sustainability in the wallet as well as all other forms of sustainability.

Thanks

William

Re-opened and improved!

breadworkshop — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:38:42 +0000

These past five days have been a whirlwind of work. We looked at all the recipe’s of our wholesale and sandwich bread in minute details. Carefully playing with better fermentation times we have made the bread more flavorful with much better textures and crusts. Though we changed little of the recipe’s themselves, the techniques are going to be subtly changed over the next few weeks. Our sourdough breads are the best examples of our improved fermentation times.

Cafe closed for the Holiday

breadworkshop — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 22:21:02 +0000

Our Cafe is going to be closed from July 3rd to July 7 for cleaning, maintenance and improvements.

We are #2

breadworkshop — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:44:21 +0000

The Baylist readers voted us the second best sandwich shop in the Bay area for the second year running!

Thank you for your support and congratulations to Ike’s who got number one!

Voting for Baylist has begun!

breadworkshop — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:50:36 +0000

Last year we were voted 2nd bast sandwich shop in Baylist. The voting has just begun for this year! If you like us please, here is the link:

Seasonality and Sustainability

breadworkshop — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 22:59:59 +0000

An essential part of sustainability is to be true to seasonal foods. If a food is in season then you can be pretty sure that it has its best nutritional value, its best price points and most important of all its best flavor. Organic production is much easier to do when a product is in season, so the price difference between organic and non organic diminishes. This means it is financially more sustainable as well.
It is now Citrus season! Blood oranges, grapefruits and tangerines are flavorful and cheap. Asparagus is also coming on strong, though it came in a bit later than last year. To find our seasonal weekly and daily specials, check out our Facebook Page.

Happy Hour and Menu Updates

sourwheat — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 16:49:57 +0000

Happy Hour has started up! Every day from 4:30pm-6:00pm draft beers are $3.50 a pint, and our house wine is $3.00/glass, $6.25/half carafe.

The following appetizers are available:

Tostadas – Two corn tostadas topped with tomatillo sauce, vegetarian or buffalo chili, monterey jack cheese, salsa fresca, julienned lettuce and crème fraîche. [Can be served vegan.] $4.25

Grilled Rosemary Polenta – Organic polenta made with fresh rosemary and asiago cheese, served with roasted bell and poblano peppers. $4.25

Bruschetta – Three grilled slices of our organic Zapaton bread brushed with extra virgin olive oil, topped with organic tomatoes, garlic, basil and provolone cheese. [Can be served vegan.] $4.75

Roasted Aleppo Potatoes – Organic potatoes coated with Syrian aleppo pepper, garlic and olive oil, roasted and then served with crème fraîche. [Can be served vegan.] $4.25

Baguette with Green Onion Cream Cheese Spread – Sliced baguette with green onion cream cheese spread made with Sierra Nevada cream cheese. $3.00

Buffalo Burger Sliders – Three mini burgers made from Big Sky Ranch Buffalo, served with house organic pickles and our organic ketchup. $6.50

Jicama Sticks – Sticks of fresh jicama (a South American Tuber) tossed in a light dressing of lime and salt. $2.95

The newest versions of our Lunch and Dinner menus are now available online, as well as our current menu for Weekend Brunch.

The Bread Workshop Hosts Sprouts

sourwheat — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 15:35:33 +0000

The Bread Workshop is proud to have hosted three sessions with the Sprouts Cooking Club, a Bay Area program designed to get kids cooking.

Using our facilities under the tutelage of our Owner and Chef du Cuisine, William Briscoe, the Sprouts kids made individual-sized organic apple pies, cheesecakes, and pumpkin pies.

The enthusiasm of the kids was infectious and they produced some top quality pies here at our bakery. One of the participants, Sam, was present for each session, and after expressing interest in Vegan Cupcakes I was making kindly shared his own recipe with me. I’ll be testing it out at home in here, in the Workshop’s kitchen.

Sam also won a kid’s cooking competition sponsored by Sprouts (see his win on YouTube) and has been invited on a cooking tour of France over his Spring Break. He’s currently raising money for his trip by selling holiday cookies which can be ordered (a $10 minimum) until 12/22.

Order an organic holiday pie from us for the dinner table, and a few bags of cookies from Sam for under the tree!