Todd Barraclough didn’t set out to be a baker. After leaving his job as a dental technician in 2006—after fifteen years—he shifted his focus to raising his two daughters together with his wife. He wanted to feed his family the best possible food, so he decided to try baking his own bread at home.
The first loaves worked out pretty well so Todd kept going, and even started to experiment a little. He gave some of his bread to the neighbours, and they liked it. He kept learning and kept experimenting, and his obsession grew and grew.
In 2013, he went to San Francisco to attend the San Francisco Baking Institute, a world-renowned centre for artisanal bread and pastry making. He spent two and a half months learning to make bread in an old-world, European style using a natural “levain” or starter that he first made at the Institute, and continues to use to this day.
Now the neighbours were buying Todd’s bread every week.
In early 2015, he returned to the San Francisco Baking Institute, this time to learn viennoiserie—a French style of baking that includes croissants, brioche and pain au chocolat.
He wanted to keep going, so he went looking for places to sell his baking, starting with local farmers’ markets. Today, his loyal customers return week after week for his all-natural, artisanal bread and viennoiserie. They must really like it.