photos by Stephanie Cameron
The aroma of something sweet baking in the oven conjures comforting and heartwarming childhood memories for most of us. Visits to the local bakery for a Sunday treat linger into adulthood, and no matter how old we get (or health-conscious, for that matter), it’s difficult to resist the temptation of melt-in-your-mouth croissants, macarons, warm donuts, or savory quiches. New Mexico’s local bakeries are the perfect celebration of breakfast and the craft of food. For this issue, we set out to discover some of our state’s local bakeries, and although this list is by no means comprehensive, it is a sampling of from-scratch delicacies worth seeking out.
Burque Bakehouse
The Burque Bakehouse began as a stand at Albuquerque’s downtown weekend farmers markets (Downtown Growers’ Market and The Rail Yards Market), where for the last two years they have sold their pastries. The Bakehouse is a from-scratch, small-batch modern bakery featuring modern French-style pastries along with American flavors and local influences. The pastry selection includes tarts, macarons, and a range of viennoiseries. Owner Sarah Ciccotello says, “We focus our energies on sourcing the highest quality ingredients, and then treating those ingredients with the utmost respect, producing each pastry with attention to detail at every single stage in the process.”
Do you have any formal training?
I came to New Mexico in the late nineties to study at UNM and have made Albuquerque my home since. I began as the pastry chef for the James Beard Award–winning Compound Restaurant in Santa Fe and for Zacatecas in Albuquerque. I then went on to lead the pastry team at Los Poblanos in Los Ranchos de Albuquerque.
Do you have formal training?
I attended culinary school at both CNM and the San Francisco Baking Institute.
What is your favorite thing to bake?
I enjoy having my hands in dough. I like taking simple ingredients like flour, water, yeast, salt, and butter and turning them into a delicious, flakey croissant. The challenge of creating many delicate layers is very rewarding.
Do you have specialty items that are hard to find elsewhere?
We are trying to bring European-inspired patisserie to the Burque. Our Green Chile Croissant is a great example of combining local flavors with traditional methods, and is an item I have not seen elsewhere.
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
Our most popular item is the Twice-baked Almond Croissant. It begins as a classic butter croissant, crafted over a three-day period. It is then sliced open, brushed with rum syrup, filled and topped with almond frangipane, covered in almonds, and finally baked again.
What else do you want our readers to know about your bakery?
In addition to being a part of the vibrant downtown market scene, our pastries can be found daily at Zendo Art and Coffee in Albuquerque. Orders can also be placed in advance for pickup at The Bakehouse on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, from 10am to12pm.
505-234-6294
Farmhouse cafÉ and Bakery
Micah Roseberry, owner of Farmhouse Café and Bakery in Taos, sources the majority of Farmhouse’s one-hundred-percent organic and non-GMO ingredients within miles of the café. This includes everything from the fall harvest calabasas grown by the Parr Field/Enos Garcia Elementary School Garden Project to the Painter Ranch bison burgers. Thus, some menu items, which often come with gluten-free and vegan options, can vary somewhat from season to season. The local lamb; Sangre de Cristo wild mushroom shepherd’s pie with gluten-free gravy; and the garden-fresh kale salad with feta, walnuts, and cranberries are local favorites. And let’s not forget dessert. The three-layer carrot cake with organic cream cheese frosting is on the top of the list. Since starting the Farmhouse Bakery, Micah’s son, Isaac Carmona, has taken on the role of head baker and co-founded the Farmhouse school lunch program.
How long have you been baking?
My [Isaac’s] first experience was baking in kindergarten at the Country Day School in Taos.
What inspired you to start baking?
Silke, my Waldorf teacher, was from Germany, and we made bread and rolls each week, grinding the wheat by hand. Growing up on my family’s farm, Cerro Vista Farm, a one-hundred-seventy-five member CSA north of Taos, I learned at an early age how to grow vegetables and grains and appreciate our own northern New Mexico varieties.
Do you have formal training?
My professional training is in mechanical drafting, but after graduating from the Community College of Denver, I returned to Taos and co-founded the Farmhouse organic local school lunch program.
What is your favorite thing to bake?
I presently bake bread, rolls, buns, pizza crust, scones, and cookies for four hundred fifty school meals every day. I apprenticed with Jo Sandoval, who has baked for more than twenty years (three years for Farmhouse Café) and learned how to bake an amazing assortment of pastries, pies, bread, and cakes for the restaurant. Jo is an amazing baker and I am continually inspired by her.
Do you have specialty items that are hard to find elsewhere?
Farmhouse Café and Bakery uses only organic and local ingredients and specializes in gluten-free cakes and pastry items with the carrot cake being the most popular. It’s made with locally grown carrots, and topped with an icing made from Organic Valley cream cheese. It’s hard to keep the bakery case full!
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
Besides the carrot cake, I bake fresh scones and cinnamon rolls every day, but the croissant is really the house specialty. Our croissants are made with Sangre de Cristo wheat flour grown thirty miles north of Taos and rolled out with Organic Valley butter. It’s really time consuming, but a labor of love. Each day I make a variety of plain; Beeler’s ham and smoked gouda; turkey, green chile, and cheddar; raspberry and cream cheese; and chocolate croissants.
What else do you want our readers know about your bakery?
Come visit me at the Farmhouse. You’ll find me baking every morning, delivering school lunches, and I even drive the tractor for the annual Harvest Festival.
1405 Paseo del Pueblo Norte, Taos, 575-758-5683
www.farmhousetaos.com
Fano Bread Company
Fano Bread Company is a family bakery, owned by Ivy and Michael Rizzo, with a quarter-century-long mission of providing New Mexicans with delectable bread from time-tested recipes. The bakery opened twenty-five years ago as a ma-and-pa owned corner bread shop. “My mother sold bread out of a tiny storefront on Fourth Street,” says Michael. “Folks were looking for artisan breads and our little Italian family wanted to provide that. Then people started coming in and asking, ‘Can you make this delicious bread or that delicious bread for our restaurant or grocery store or family?’ and that’s how we grew. We grew by local families and business owners telling us their dreams for their tables, and that has equalled a whole lot of yummy, fresh-baked bread over the years.”
Ciabatta bread from Fano Bread Company.
Do you have specialty items that are hard to find elsewhere?
I think the special thing we provide is a place you can come and get really good bread of almost any style imaginable. We pay the same attention to the quality of flour and form in our artisan rustic loaves as our brioche burger buns. We really love it when our customers come in and say, “This has been our family bread. Grandma always had Fano at family dinner.” We want you to think quality, health, and love.
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
I guess we are best known for our rustic loaf as that’s the bread that really made us a full-scale bakery. You can use rustic for pretty much any occasion. And our green chile cheese rolls are what we bring whenever we’re invited over to dinner.
What else do you want our readers to know about your bakery?
We want to see every New Mexican family have the opportunities we have had. We believe in workers’ rights and support the Healthy Workforce ABQ Initiative to get paid sick leave for the people of Bernalillo County and beyond. We see a future where all New Mexican children have access to great food as well as a great education. We see bread as a way to community, a community we believe in and are very thankful for.
4605 McLeod NE, Albuquerque, 505-884-5555
www.fanobreadcompany.com
Rebel Donut
Rebel Donut, Albuquerque’s premier artisan donut shop, showcases more than thirty donut flavors with new and different surprises daily. Jeffrey and Carrie Mettling are the husband-and-wife team behind Rebel Donut.
Carrie has two degrees in architecture from UNM, but she left that field in 2006 to open her first business, Cake Fetish. “After selling it, I explored other careers in design and construction until I realized that I am most at home in a kitchen covered in flour. I opened Rebel Donut with my husband in 2012 and Sugar Crush, a bakery, in 2016. I have six-year-old twins who are my best taste testers and my reason for working as hard as I do,” she says.
How long have you been baking?
I have been baking since the third or fourth grade when I got my first Easy-Bake oven. I got more serious about it in my late twenties, still just doing it as a hobby and for friends. By the time I made three or four wedding cakes for my co-workers, I realized how much I truly enjoyed it and decided to open my own business.
What do you love about being a baker?
The thing I love most about baking is the creative freedom and the joy that beautiful food brings to other people. It’s an ego driven art in a different way than architecture is. I’m not looking to create something to endure decades. I’m just after the joy and memories I can leave people with. That’s what drives me.
Do you have formal training?
I have zero formal training. People thought I was crazy to open a bakery without it, but I’m pretty stubborn. I didn’t bother having a plan B.
What is your favorite thing to bake?
I still like to bake cakes, but I have a serious love for donuts—which are not exactly baked. I have found that donuts give me far more creative satisfaction. The shape and flavor combinations are limitless.
Do you have specialty items that are hard to find elsewhere?
We have some great locally inspired donuts like Blue Corn Piñon and the Azteca. Some of our best sellers are the French Toast and the Red Velvet.
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
Our most popular item has to be the French Toast. It’s a yeast-raised square donut that’s tossed in cinnamon and sugar with a dollop of sweet butter and a drizzle of maple.
What else do you want our readers know about your bakery?
Our employees are very creative and they have the freedom to invent product on the fly. Some amazingly delicious things get thought up at 4am. What some people may not know is that we will produce the donut of your dreams for you. Challenge us. I’m sure there are a few things we haven’t thought of yet. But just a few.
2435 Wyoming NE, Albuquerque, 505-293-0553
9311 Coors NW, Albuquerque, 505-898-3090
www.rebeldonut.com
La Quiche Parisienne Bistro
La Quiche has been selling at Albuquerque’s Downtown Growers’ Market for over nine years. Paris natives Bruno Barachin, master baker, and his wife, Sabine Pasco, pastry chef, own La Quiche. They opened their first brick and mortar in 2006, in downtown Albuquerque and relocated to the Heights in 2013.
Barachin says, “At La Quiche we strive to provide the best fresh ingredients and the full authentic quality of French cuisine without going to France. With a wide variety of menu items to choose from, there is sure to be something to make you and your tastebuds come back for more! Come visit us and see our wonderful selection of lunch and breakfast items. We offer a wide variety of pastries and bread, along with specialty items and tasty glasses of wine to pair. We strive to give you the best dining experience in the Albuquerque area.”
What do you love about being a baker?
First, baking from scratch is not a simple job. You need patience, personality, discipline, observation, knowledge, and courage.
Do you have formal training?
I learned how to bake through a French organization of craftsmen from 1982 to 1985 in Bordeaux and Paris. After thirty-six years of baking and two diplomas (CAP-Master), I am still learning every day.
What is your favorite thing to bake?
The best part of my work is croissant dough.
Why do you like to bake?
Because I eat good bread, good pastry, and good food every day. It’s my life!
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
Quiche. We are known for our almond croissants at the Downtown Growers’ Market. Everything is made from scratch. Our pastry by Sabine is upscale and to die for.
What else do you want our readers to know about your bakery?
We have a French menu for breakfast and lunch every day, from omelettes to mussels to steak and frites.
5850 Eubank NE, Albuquerque, 505-242-2808
www.laquicheparisiennebistro.com
dulce bakery
Opened in 2010, Dulce is co-owned by pastry chef Dennis Adkins and Kirk Barnett. Dulce uses local ingredients whenever possible “so that the money you spend at Dulce stays in the local economy. Our flour is locally grown by Sangre de Cristo Agricultural Producers north of Taos. The free-range chickens that lay our eggs live in Estancia on a diet free of antibiotics and steroids. The all-natural milk we use comes from the cows at Rasband Dairy in Albuquerque.” Dulce is Spanish for sweet. “Not only does our name describe what we do, it embodies our overall business philosophy. If we are sweet with what we serve and how we serve it, then we hope to spread a little sweetness to our customers. Our goal is for all of our customers to walk away happy because of what and how we serve them.”
What do you love about being a baker?
My [Adkins’] favorite things about being a baker are the chemistry involved in the baking process, the smell of the baked goods as they bake in the oven, and the creativity involved in creating new menu items. My biggest inspirations are my late mother and the creative possibilities that baking can provide.
Do you have formal training?
I trained at Los Angeles Trade Technical College and graduated in 2002, then attended Bellouet Conseil in Paris.
What is your favorite thing to bake?
My favorite things to bake are yeasted products such as croissants, breads, and puff pastry.
Do you have specialty items that are hard to find elsewhere?
Dulce’s products are differentiated more by our made-from-scratch quality rather than our variety. But we do offer a large assortment of baked items that are less common at other bakeries, including individually-sized tarts, cheesecakes, creme brûlée, and bread pudding.
What is your most popular item—what are you known for?
Our most popular baked item is quiche. Usually we offer about six different varieties.
What else do you want our readers know about your bakery?
All of our items are made by hand, fresh from scratch, including our croissants and danishes, tart shells, pie crusts, pastry creams, fillings, glazes and frostings, biscotti, and even the caramel and chocolate sauce that go into our espresso beverages.
1100 Don Diego, Santa Fe, 505-989-9966
www.dulcebakery.com
Edible celebrates New Mexico's food culture, season by season. We believe that knowing where our food comes from is a powerful thing. With our high-quality, aesthetically pleasing and informative publication, we inspire readers to support and celebrate the growers, producers, chefs, beverage and food artisans, and other food professionals in our community.
