5 Minutes with the Baking Birds!

We enjoyed a quick chat with the Baking Birds (aka Lizzie and Bekki) based in Upwey, Dorset!

Bakers start work notoriously early – when does the day begin for you and Lizzie?
Generally speaking our day starts at 6am – so it’s not too bad. We make our bread using a long fermentation method. The ferment is made the day before and left overnight to work its magic, then we make the dough in the morning so the bread is usually out by about 9.00am. During the summer season with all the food festivals it can be earlier, but hey – best part of the day and all that jazz.


All your baking looks delicious and so different – what are your best sellers/most popular? 
Thank you! Both of us have a very low boredom threshold and are very keen on seasonality, so our range changes fairly regularly. There are, however, a few constants such as our seeded Maltstar bread and the omnipresent chocolate brownie (which Purbeck are now using in their new Chocolate brownie flavour ice cream - mmm). A couple of newbies have, over the last few weeks, become popular, such as the filled savoury croissants, the apricot and fennel seed bread and the mixed game pasties.          


We love the idea that your ingredients are sourced locally and sound absolutely scrummy – how do you decide which suppliers to use?
Well proofs in the eating as they say, but joking aside it all comes down to quality, flavour and the fact that we live in a county with so many great producers. We are fortunate to be part of the Dorset Farmers Markets so we have met, and continue to meet, great people making awesome products at the markets. We are also very lucky in some cases – like we have a fantastic free range egg farm just down the road from the bakery. The provenance of the food that we eat I think is a growing concern to a growing number of people, so it’s important both to us and our customers that both the quality and the manner in which our ingredients are produced is spot on.


We apologise in advance for this one - how do you both stay so slim surrounded by so much yummy homebaking? Do you offer any healthier/ low calorie options – or is that just a silly idea!!?
Silly idea! Just yankin’ your chain. Well, for a start, we eat our food most days of the week. Not everything we make is sugar toting, butter laden work of the devil. There seems to be this fairly recent notion that bread is fattening, and to be honest everything is fattening if consumed in vast quantities! Bread is a great source of energy, and the wholegrain varieties we make are also a great source of fibre. An example of one of our bruschettas, for instance, is made using our bread, olive oil, pesto, fresh tomatoes and mozzarella cheese, which I would actually describe as a very nutritious lunch. I don’t think we could make such claims for the brownie or sticky date cake, but a little bit of what you like does you good. Variety is the key – cake for breakfast, lunch and dinner won’t do you any good, but neither will eating low fat, cardboard, God knows whats in ‘em versions of perfectly good food.  Besides which, it’s incredibly boring to eat the same old thing day in day out.

What’s next for baking birds? (perhaps selling online, expanding outside catering, introducing new ranges etc?)

As ever – new ranges to keep ourselves, and our customers on their toes. There are also another couple of avenues that we will be exploring in the not so distant future, such as online sales though our website – brownie by post anyone? We have also had enquires about bread making courses, which is something we would like to explore further. Other than that, one day we would really like to scribble down how we make some of these crazy baked creations in a book.

We know you are at the Farmers Markets too - have you got any other events lined up?

Lots to keep us occupied over the coming months – Dorset knob throwing (no really), Melpash show, Bridport food festival, and Camp Bestival are among some of the events we will be attending this year. As always, we will be at Poundbury, Bridport, Sherborne and Dorchester Farmers Market, and we will also be holding an open day at the bakery in June to celebrate our first year at Windsbatch – check our website and Facebook page for further details.  


Windsbatch bakery at Friar Wadden Road is open 9.30am to 1.30pm and we can definitely recommend popping in!  

The wonderful Bekki and Lizzie are offering 10% off until the end of April. Just send them an email and quoting Loving Dorset and they'll send you a discount code!