Think bread is the enemy? That half-baked notion won’t cut it in Asheville.
The city, called the ‘Paris of the South’ for its vibrant arts and food scenes, is on the rise as a bakery hotspot
‘Just a few ingredients make a beautiful, wonderful loaf of bread.’
AMANDA PLYLER, owner of Dogwood Cottage Baking School
‘Artisans have been attracted to this area for a long time because it’s a hub of craft, whether you’re a potter, a painter, or a baker.’
SUSANNAH GEBHART (below), founder of OWL Bakery
ASHEVILLE, N.C. — In November, the French baguette was awarded UNESCO heritage status — it’s a cultural icon. But to some, bread is a carb-laden foe and destroyer of diets (with its diabolical sidekick, butter). And yet, bread made of whole wheat, whole grains, sprouts, and sourdough is a staple of the Mediterranean diet, widely considered one of the healthiest ways to eat. In January 2023, US News & World Report ranked the Mediterranean diet number one in multiple categories.
If you’re of the “bread = evil,” “carbs never touch my lips” contingent, you’ll find few compatriots in Asheville. (With the exception of celiac disease sufferers, who must avoid wheat.) The city of makers — called the “Paris of the South” for its vibrant arts and food scenes — is on the rise as a bakery hotspot. Surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains, this city of about 100,000 people boasts two local millers and several talented bakers.
Adding to the bread-cred: the annual Asheville Bread Festival (www.ashevillebreadfestival.com ), held April 22-23 this year. Launched in 2004, the festival hosts workshops, a master class, and a panel discussion by industry experts. The first day is designed for avid amateur bakers, with a second day geared to professionals. A highlight: A bread fair showcasing the work of about 20 of the region’s bakeries. Drawing 1,500 people or so, “It’s a really special event for Asheville,” says Dave Workman of Flat Rock Bakery. “The bread festival has rounded out the food scene. There are a lot of great bakers here,” he adds.
Those ingredients make Asheville the perfect place to go for carb overload — provided you like your grains whole, your bread flavorful, and your pastries absolute perfection.
Best of bread
“I don’t understand the war on bread. Bread is life,” says Amanda Plyler, owner of Dogwood Cottage Baking School (www.dogwoodcottagebaking.com ), located just north of Asheville. “Bread is under attack today,” she notes. “And yes, grocery store bread has 15 to 30 ingredients,” some of which are difficult to pronounce. “But just a few ingredients make a beautiful, wonderful loaf of bread.” Her advice to the bread-phobic? “If you buy bread, look for the fewest, simplest ingredients. If you can bake your bread at home, do it.”
To that end, we signed up for a class at Dogwood Cottage (the school offers two classes each week plus private lessons.) Under the tutelage of Plyler and instructor Leehe Stegall, we made challah, a rich, braided bread that goes back to biblical times and is often part of the Jewish Sabbath: a simple mixture of water, yeast, flour, egg, honey, and salt. There’s something incredibly satisfying about punching down dough, and kneading it until it’s smooth and elastic. Many of us leaned into the therapeutic qualities of baking bread during the pandemic, when everyone was making sourdough. (Remember the great yeast shortage of 2020?)
Of course, “sourdough is not a trend — it’s been around for millennia,” says Susannah Gebhart, founder of OWL (Old World Levain) Bakery in Asheville, with outposts in North and West Asheville (www.owlbakery.com). A semifinalist for the James Beard Outstanding Baker award in 2022, Asheville’s most decorated baker has a New England connection: she studied food anthropology at Middlebury College in Vermont. Gebhart started OWL in 2014, making sourdough bread in a wood-fired oven. All of those home bread-bakers have led to a boom in bakeries, Gebhart says: “It’s created an appreciation for the craft and the process, which is really gratifying.”
In Asheville, it’s not uncommon to encounter homesteaders, who live as sustainably as possible, tending gardens and raising chickens and livestock in their backyards. Given that connection to the earth and DIY mentality, there is “a rich community of bakers that goes way back historically,” Gebhart notes. “Artisans have been attracted to this area for a long time because it’s a hub of craft, whether you’re a potter, a painter, or a baker.”
Grains of truth
And there’s this: craft grain mills have sprouted (pun intended) in the area. This has really encouraged bakers who want to use the best ingredients and interesting or heirloom grains, Gebhart says. “Having two artisan millers [locally] really changes the game.”
Jennifer Lapidus, owner of Carolina Ground flour mill (www.carolinaground.com), is living proof of Asheville’s baking evolution. A baker herself, and the author of “Southern Ground: Reclaiming Flavor Through Stone-Milled Flour” (Ten Speed Press), Lapidus is a lead organizer of the Asheville Bread Festival.
At her downtown mill, launched in 2012 (recently relocated to a larger site), Lapidus produces intensely flavorful, cold-stone milled flour made from grains grown in the South (except for spelt, which is sourced from Pennsylvania). This allows bakers to move away from industrial commodity flours — roller-milled to taste the same, no matter where it’s from — to create sustainable, artisanal products. Industrial flour is functional but stripped of its natural flavor, Lapidus explains. “Stoneground flour has a whole new palate of flavor. Using flavor-forward flour becomes part of the story,” she says. Words like buttery, nutty, and coffee-like are now part of the conversation.
Carolina Ground produces about 12 different flours, Lapidus says — locally grown pastry, bread, and rye flours, and whole grains — but the mission goes beyond that. “We are a network of farmers, bakers, and millers, invested in sustainable food systems,” she says. “As a community mill, we’re the bridge between independent farmers and Instagram-savvy bakers.”
Good to know, but as a visitor (and bread lover, if you’ve read this far), you really want to taste that bread. Of course, you’ll visit OWL Bakery to sample the cardamom buns, country loaf, or squirrel loaf (“Made with things squirrels eat,” like nuts and seeds, Gebhart says). Her pastries are incredible, too, including cakes decorated with edible botanicals. Thinly shaved, dehydrated apple slices are dyed with turmeric, beet powder, and hibiscus — no piped sugar roses here. There’s also the RAD (River Arts District Farmer’s Market) — look for baker Eli Je Bailey at Hominy Farm (www.hominyfarm.com), who makes an excellent sourdough flatbread topped with dried herbs and sesame seeds. All Soul’s Pizza (www.allsoulspizza.com ) is a recommended stop, and it’s worth a short side-trip to Flat Rock for a wood-fired wild mushroom pizza at Flat Rock Village Bakery (www.villagebakerync.com). Other excellent bakeries include Mother Bread & Wine (sourdough breads and naturally produced wines; www.motheravl.com) and Crust Never Sleeps (www.crustneversleeps.com). (If we ever move to Asheville, we’re launching “The Bun Also Rises,” by the way.)
Enhanced by Instagram, and fortified by the COVID pandemic, “we’re seeing a huge wave of new bakers,” Lapidus says. “The bakers are no longer stuck in the back of the kitchen — they’ve really come into their own.”