GLUTEN-FREE!
Posted by bart in Uncategorized on March 25, 2013
We’re proud to introduce the BEST GLUTEN-FREE chocolate chip cookies! What makes these different is that they are 99% indistinguishable from wheat in taste and texture. They have the same buttery taste as expected and 100% IMPORTED BELGIAN chocolate as well! For these cookies we developed our own flour! All of the commercially available flours are “General Purpose” which means they’re a compromise for everything… our flour is not a compromise, we spent months developing it for our cookies and it’s nothing less than PERFECT!
One Great Store!
Posted by bart in Uncategorized on February 3, 2013
This is one of our premier accounts in the Los Angeles area. Jackson Market is located in Culver City, just up the street from the Sony Studio. Very European! Nick, the owner lives next door -they have wonderful, personal service and in addition to supporting our cookies they carry a variety of specialty goods as well as serving the best coffee and making the most fantastic sandwiches for the lunch crowd
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Fancy Food Show 1-21-13
Posted by bart in Uncategorized on January 26, 2013
Jordan & I had a very successful show in San Francisco. Lots of excitement about our new GLUTEN-FREE cookies, EXTREME Chocolate, Chocolate Chip Cookies and Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Cookies! 2013 will be a good year! Thank you to all!
Bart TV interview!
Posted by bart in Uncategorized on December 26, 2012
:30 minutes of LA TV dedicated to great cookies!! Nothing could be better!
Bart's live TV interview
Important lesson learned (re-learned)
Posted by bart in Uncategorized on December 15, 2012
ok, so I made a slight alteration in our long standing cookie recipe about 2 weeks ago. Truth be told, I have always harbored a sublime feeling that I could do better with our cookies. I’m gratified and proud that thousands and thousands of people love our cookies and that we’ve been able to employ my philosophic soap-box of sorts. So, I analysed my art-of-the-cookie to test a thought AND, it has been worthwhile!
So, after tasting them this morning (Saturday, 12-15-12) , I can FINALLY say that for the first time in 8 years and something like 800 batches, we have reached perfection. I set aside samples from our baking 3 weeks ago and they are decidedly the best cookies that we’ve EVER baked and our recipe is finally, finalized.
In all matters, ALWAYS follow your heart and intuition.
Thank you all for your support, Bart
Secrets of Cookie Shelf Life
Posted by Penina in Cookie Ingredients on August 31, 2012
What do cookie sellers do to extend shelf life? Take a quick tour of the steps that go into your favorite (and maybe not so favorite) store-bought cookies.
Mason jar photo by Ben Grader
Preservatives
Do we really need to name them? There are NO preservatives in Bart’s cookies! The point here is: if a big cookie manufacturer wants their cookies to last on the grocery store shelves, they will most likely add perservatives. This is particularly true for soft, chewy cookies. Here’s why:
Moisture Level
In general, without preservatives, the more moisture in a cookie, the shorter the shelf life. Certain natural (or mostly natural) ingredients are used that help cookies retain a moisture level customers like. These include replacing all or part of the butter with vegetable shortening, or adding texture enhancers like modified food starch and guar gum.
Bart prefers to use top quality butter only, and to slighly overbake his cookies. Combined with airtight packaging, we get a shelf life of 90 days and YOU get cookies that taste (and smell… mmmmmmm!!) exactly the same as they did when they came out of the oven!
Packaging
Special airtight, heat sealed packaging is a great way to make sure cookies stay fresh on the grocer’s shelves. Oxygen ages everything, including food, so an oxygen-barrier pouch is one of the most important things we can do keep our cookies tasting great.
Once you open the pouch, one of the best ways to ensure longer shelf life at home is to put the remaining cookies in a sealed, airtight container. This is something our family has NEVER had to consider. In our house, once a pouch of Bart’s cookies is opened, every last cookie inside is doomed.
A note about unopened pouches
If you’re the sort of person who prefers to work through Bart’s cookies at a liesurely pace (though I’m not really sure how you pull that off), then pop the sealed pouches in the fridge or freezer.
And a bonus tidbit!
Isn’t the internet a wonderful place? There’s a whole website (at least one!) dedicated to shelf life! Check out shelflifeadvice.com, or click here to see what they say about shelf life and cookies (including home baked).
It’s true: whether they are our Original Style chocolate chip cookies, or our new, Special Edition cookies, Bart uses only top quality natural ingredients and never uses preservatives!
Take a Long Look at Slow Food
Posted by Penina in Good Food, Organic Farming on July 9, 2012
What is Slow Food?
The best thing about Slow Food is that it is not Fast Food!
It’s about traditional and regional cuisine, and locally-sourced ingredients. It’s about choosing sustainably-produced foods and supporting local, small businesses. It’s also a bit of push-back against the globalization of agriculture, and our food and dining choices.
Founder and President of the Slow Food movement, Carlo Petrini, has said, “everyone has the right to good, clean and fair food.” Good, meaning a high quality product with a flavorful taste, clean, meaning naturalness in the way the food was produced and transported, and fair, meaning reasonable pricing and treatment for both consumers and producers.
We’re humans and we eat. Not only do we need food to sustain ourselves, but over generations, from quiet conversation over coffee to nationwide feasts, food has become central to how we celebrate our connections to each other and to our world. Sadly, those traditions collapse when we hurriedly grab a mass-produced burger that is often identical from the midwestern U.S. to a small town in Asia.
Of course, there have always been times food had to be eaten on the go. They say that’s how the sandwich was born! Still, our food choices have a ripple affect that is at least as global as a multinational food chain.
To learn more, visit the Slow Food website where you can learn how to preserve your culinary heritage, become a “co-producer” and find like-minded neighbors who may be near you or across the globe. There are hundreds of Slow Food Chapters around the world, organizing events and other opportunities to get re-connected with the magical networks of growers, processors, cooks and consumers that sustain our bodies and our souls.
Bart’s Bakery prizes great food and regional specialties. We don’t always stay local, importing certain ingredients from far away. We do say no to tasteless, heartless ingredients, and celebrate the best our earth has to offer with top quality ingredients packed with regional pride. That’s why we use imported French butter and organic Madagascar vanilla.
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