Bakery uses its loaf to stay in business with deliveries
A bakery housed in a former prisoner of war camp has moved onto a wartime footing to supply bread across parts of central Scotland.
The Wild Hearth Bakery has mobilised vans to provide a free home delivery service during the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
The Comrie-based business is gearing up to provide housebound residents with products which are normally on the menu in the country’s top restaurants.
Owner John Castley said:“A large part of our business has been for farmers markets and the hospitality industry and that has been seriously impacted.
“With restaurants closing down we are having to diversify into the home delivery market and we would urge people to support businesses like ours at this time.
“We have all seen the chaos in supermarkets and shelves being cleared of bread, but we can assure people we can produce and supply what they need.”
Wild Hearth breads and pastries have been on the menu at Scotland’s only two Michelin starred restaurant, Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles, as well as The Peat Inn in Cupar and The Cellar at Anstruther.
John set the sourdough bakery up in the unlikely surroundings of a Nissen hut at the former Cultybraggan PoW camp in Perthshire in 2015.
The eco-sustainable artisan bakery, featuring one of the country’s largest wood-fired ovens, formerly housed Nazi prisoners during the Second WorldWar.
After initially working in IT, John retrained as a chef at Ballymalloe Cookery School in Ireland in 2010 and worked for five years at a number of London restaurants, most notably with Theo Randall at the Intercontinental.
John’s door-to-door service aims to cover Perthshire, Fife, Stirling, Edinburgh, Dundee and Clackmannanshire and will be delivering fresh products four days a week.
Full details of delivery days and advance ordering options are on the company website at www.wildhearthbakery.com