The Art Of — Herban Garden

Hello! My name is Andy Zalar and I am a baker out of Western New York. A normal day for me involves clouds of flour and dough covered hands as I mix, fold, and proof the daily bread selection. Bread is the blank canvas that I fill with ingredients

in need of a second life.

I use bread as a recycling bin for food that is still edible but left in the void of not having a home.  Leftover herbs, spices, fruit peels, vegetable skins, cheese rinds and even coffee find a second home mixed among the crumb structure of my bread. The results are fun flavor combinations which include Preserved Lemon Peel and Jalapeno, Sea Salt and Cheese Broth Sourdough, Black Bean and Red Beet Pulp, “SeaWheat” (seaweed and wheat), and Charred Pepper Skin Wheat, and some failures that include Pickle Juice Wheat and Celery Juice Sourdough. Reworking these ingredients expands their versatility and gives them added value.

 

 

The concept of the Herban Garden candle mirrors my bread philosophy. Reusing the candle holder as a potted plant gives new value to an otherwise disposable item.  Once planted and grown, the herbs can then be used in an infinite amount of ways. The abundance of herbs that were cultivated from the Herban Garden candle were used in a gremolata for a lamb roast and then reworked in to a citrus and herb sourdough bread (shown).  I started with a candle and ended with bread and barely consumed any wax along the way.