Tash Silva is surprised and grateful for the enthusiasm of her
customers both young and old, who come each week to purchase
her baked goods from her self-serve bake stand.
The secret is out and now Tash Silva can’t keep her self-serve bake stand full for more than a couple of hours. Last Saturday, all 30 of her sourdough loaves were gone in the first hour and by noon the baking display cabinet was almost bare.
For her sake it’s a good thing she only offers products on Friday and Saturday mornings as while it looks like a business on the surface, 1885 Bake stand is a labour of love, and as the name suggests, operates in an old-school tradition.
It began a few months ago when after much encouragement from family and friends, Tash launched her self-serve bake stand offering freshly baked bread and sweets Friday afternoons and Saturday morning until she is sold out which happens quickly. Items are on display in a glass-faced cabinet on the porch of the 1885 farmhouse where she lives with her husband and three daughters on County Rd. 10 in Mount Pleasant.
Tash has always had a sweet tooth, and grew up in a home where baked goods were homemade; no store bought cookies or cakes were allowed. When she worked as a hygienist, she was known to carry a stash of candies in her pockets but that all changed when she popped into the dental chair herself and discovered seven cavities resulting from her candy cravings. Determined to satisfy her sweet tooth without sacrificing her teeth, she returned to her mother’s philosophy and began to bake, using pure, clean ingredients: lots of fruit and minimal organic cane sugar for sweetness, unbleached, high protein non-GMO flour and sourdough starter as the natural leavener. The sourdough base of her baked goods make them easy to digest.
The baked goods may disappear quickly but take a great deal of time to prepare. The bread dough rises and proofs over three days because the only leavening agent is a sourdough starter. All of the mixing and kneading is done by hand. The work accelerates as the week progresses with loaves getting shaped, resting and shaped again. While she has a large kitchen, it has a single over which means producing all of her products takes planning.
Each bake day she produces 30 loaves of sourdough bread and three or four other baked goods which usually include what she calls scrolls(shaped like cinnamon rolls but often fruit flavoured), cookies, cupcakes, donuts or sweetbreads. All have been baked that morning. She begins at 4am with the sourdough bread, baking six at a time, followed by cookies and finishing with the scrolls, which are often coming out of the oven as her customers arrive.
Despite the fact that she setup the business as a self-serve venue, Tash has discovered that what she really enjoys is meeting her customers. Her regulars know to come early, and sometimes her customers are already sitting on her porch chatting to each other before she opens the stand. She explains that for her there is no feeling like delivering warm baked treats made by your own hands into the hands of the people who will consume them. For Tasha, that feels like serving her community, which is what really brings her joy.
Tasha is pleased and surprised by the warm welcome she has received from her customers and hates to disappoint those who show up too late. She might have to purchase a bread oven in order to boost her capacity and simplify her baking schedule, but it is early days for that kind of investment.
1885 Bake stand is open Fridays from 2 to 6pm and Saturdays from 10am to 2pm, or until it is sold out. Get there early to avoid disappointment.