Boules? Before we begin, I'd like to define this word, as this is the French bakery lingo name for the shape of our sourdough breads. It's pronounced bool' or bool'eh and it means "ball." Boule is singular and boules is the plural.
And now we return to our regularly scheduled program...
It's just about mid-February, and you know what that means: it's time for romance and running backs; lovers and long field goals; candles and crazy Super Bowl commercials! These two occasions couldn't be any more opposite, but they do have at least one thing in common: awesome food!
And here at Random Acts of Breadness, we've got both days covered with our organic artisan sourdough breads and complementary delectables to go with them.
Starting with our sourdough breads, we're continuing the tradition we started last February, by adding hearts and footballs to our bread score designs (the triangle cut is our signature score).
This weekend only (while supplies last), you can leave with any or all of the 3 designs for our Artisan Sourdough Country Loaves. And we might do a few Cinnamon Raisin Maple Pecan loaves with special score designs, as well!
But (as Shakespeare might have said) a loaf of Breadness alone doth not a romantic gift nor a football feast make. One must peruse our potions and preserves, butters and balsamics, and tantalizing tapenades that will bring joy and jubilation to those on the receiving end! It is your duty to discover the perfect pairing (or trairing?) that will elevate your experience to another level. If you need assistance choosing the right accoutrements, we can help.
We interrupt this program to bring you the following special announcement...
RAW FARM BUTTER STICKS ARE BACK!!!
It's been over a year since we could no longer get 1-lb. boxes of Raw Farm butter with separate 1/4-lb. sticks. (We received 1-lb. tubs instead, which needed to be hand-cut into quarters and individually zip-bagged to keep fresh in our customers' freezers; a time-intensive process which I dutifully did so that our customers could still enjoy this unique butter.) The dairy needed to replace their butter packaging machine and that ended up taking a lot longer than was originally predicted. At one point, the replacement unit was stuck in Canada customs for 5 months! Raw Farm Dairy is in Fresno, California. Why the delay? Who knows? And once the unit was released and it made it to Fresno, there were parts that needed to be replaced. And the technician who works on this brand of butter stick maker/wrapper lives in Lithuania, so he had to be flown to Fresno multiple times to get this highly specialized machine up and running. But now it IS up and running and we have 44 lbs. of Raw Farm butter in our freezer, available by the pound or by the stick!
This unparalleled raw butter comes in 2 versions: Cultured Unsalted (what I like to call "French Style") and Lightly Salted (uncultured, traditional flavor with a bit of sea salt).
Now you can pick up a loaf of Breadness and a stick (or two) of Raw Farm Butter (and perhaps one of our artisanal jams, honey spreads or tapenades) and go picnic at one of several parks just minutes from our bakery. Just think of the possibilities...
Our Sourdough Bread Bowls Just Got Better!
Sometimes it's the simple things that bring the most joy. While scoring hearts and footballs for our full-size loaves, I looked at our smaller bread bowl dough mounds ready to be scored and came up with the idea of cutting a circle on top that would make it easier for customers to cut the big hole for which to add their filling. Up until now, the score was our signature triangle; pretty, angular, aesthetic, but hard to cut a circle around! Now, we have not only made the circle cutting easier, but the bowl looks like one of those trendy hair styles! We'll have these Breadness Bowls fresh on Friday, frozen after that.
Also on the Rack...
We have our Cinnamon Raisin Maple Pecan Sourdough available Friday (but too fresh to slice here), sliceable on Saturday; sliced and frozen on Sunday. And, as always, we have our traditional organic Artisan Sourdough Country Loaf baked Thursday, Friday and Saturday, slow-cured and ready for sale on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. (Yes, we are open regular hours on Super Bowl Sunday, 10a to 2p)
Kudos to Lisa Grabow...
After auditioning Lisa Grabow's Beyond the Olive Tapenades and a Muffuletta last fall, I knew these would be a great addition to our savory line of products at the bakery. (Our customers agree, as once they get a sample taste of these small-batch artisanal chopped olive condiments, they light up with joy and add one or more of these to their order!)
Well... Lisa did something very special for us and her customers for Valentine's Day: she asked if she could bundle our artisan sourdough bread with various groupings of her Beyond the Olive products. After we worked out how to do this, she sent an e-mail promotion to her customers and got a very good response! So Lisa will be at the bakery today to pick up the heart-scored loaves to ship with her gift bundles, and she'll be dropping off more of the tapenades we need to replenish our stock!
Lisa has quite a collection of artisanal products which you can explore here on her website.
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