Vancouver will soon welcome a new bakery with a special mission, as local baker Tommy Aird and his team complete work on Tommy's Whole Grain Bakery in the Downtown Eastside.
Tommy's Whole Grain (TWG) is setting up its bakeshop at 338 Powell St, which had previously been home to modern Japanese-style coffee shop Harken.
"Our aim is to create the best-tasting breads and pastries while reducing food waste, and increasing the nutrient density of our food," stated Aird in a press release.
To that end, TWG will be using - as the name implies - whole grains. Aird explains why this is a key focal point in a GoFundMe set up to raise funds in support of the project: "Committing to whole grain baking is a crucial step for me as a baker to provide to most flavourful products with the highest nutritional value while supporting regional grain farmers and lowering our environmental impact," Aird writes.
"We're not just reducing food waste, we are ensuring the most nutritional parts of our food aren't being lost to archaic industrial practices."
TWG's GoFundMe has raised over $5,400 towards its $20,000 fundraising goal to date.
Among the donors supporting TWG in Vancouver is high-profile chef Dan Barber of Blue Hill at Stone Barns in New York. Aird spent some time working under Barber and in Toronto restaurants such as La Banane Restaurant and Bar Isabel before taking a head baker post in 2020 at Vancouver's acclaimed Flourist, a bakery known for milling its own flour using high-quality grains sourced from Canadian farms.
Similarly, TWG will be working with carefully selected whole grain suppliers and millers, in particular, those in British Columbia, like Cedar Isle Farms in Agassiz in the Fraser Valley.
"We partner with regional small-scale organic grain growers, so we can support the farmers doing the most important work to ensure the food system is equitable and resilient," adds the TWG team in its press release.
Expect sourdough bread, pastries, cakes, and croissants, all using whole grain flours
For TWG, Aird will take the role of essentially the "executive baker," and will focus on running the business. His second-in-command is Charlie-May Bingham in the head baker post. Bingham explains to V.I.A. by email that the two bakers met while working at Flourist; Bingham moved into Aird's role there when he departed to get TWG off the ground.
"We are now both back together, excited to bring whole grain baking to Vancouver!" says Bingham.
TWG will be putting out sourdough bread, pastries, cakes, croissants, and more. The Powell Street space will have a bar with four stools and some space inside to grab a quick bite, otherwise, says Bingham, it will be a "grab-and-go bakery."
Bingham says that the hope is to be open in early December, however, so much depends on how the next couple of weeks unfold for the new business.
Fundraising campaign ongoing: 'We can't do it on our own'
The fundraising campaign remains an essential component of TWG's launch and success. "Every contribution, investment, and loan has been a critical piece of us getting this far," explains Bingham. "The reality is, we need our community to support us to succeed. Competing in today's industry is hard enough, let alone launching a business that believes in not exploiting labour or cutting corners with the quality of our ingredients."
"Whole grain bakeries can have a compounding and cascading positive impact on our community, but we can't do it on our own," Bingham continues. "We still feel it is imperative to reach our fundraising goal, but it wouldn't stop us from opening if we don't, it would just leave us in a more precarious position."
As Aird describes on the campaign page, the donations will help fund equipment, smallwares (a restaurant industry term for smaller supplies), and packaging.
Support TWG via its crowdfunding campaign on GoFundMe and follow the new bakery on Instagram @tommyswholegrain.
Update: We checked out Tommy's Whole Grain Bakery in Vancouver
@forkingawesomevia I think I found my next birthday cake from this new Vancouver bakery! #forkingawesome #vancouverbc #bakery ♬ Daisy Lofi - fiksiadit
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