Once you have the knack for it, bread isn't hard to make. Since Lockdown #1 I've been making easy white bread, no-knead bread and even dabbled in sourdough. But making GOOD bread, consistently, is an art. Each type of bake needs to be made in just the right way so all sensory elements are perfect. For a sourdough, you want that tough, chewy crust and a moist, tangy crumb with even, big holes in. For a brioche you want a tight crumb where the dough almost looks like muscle sinews so you see how the dough has been kneaded and folded. For focaccia you want that oily yet crisp base with super floofy (yes, I said "floofy" again. I'm trademarking it.) crumb, and salty divots filled and topped with explosive flavour bombs.
This is where Union Coffee & Dough rise to the occasion (<- geddit?). Flavia and Gabriela, are two proud Brazilian ladies, who met in England 12 years ago and have been firm friends ever since. They are both the bakers for Union Coffee & Dough. All their breads are made to order and made by hand. They favour traditional baking methods and put their passion into what they do (as well as somehow managing to juggle their families and helping out with their husband's endeavours of Sassy Bird, One Delivery and Union Sourdough Pizza -which they make the dough for!) Phew! These are busy women, but as we know...…who run the world........
So, what did we try? We were delivered a glorious selection of sourdough bread, rosemary & salt focaccia, caramelised onion & goats cheese focaccia, bagels, chocolate brioche, and cinnamon buns. What a plethora!
We immediately cut into the sourdough bread. As the knife started cutting, the crust started to yield and the loaf started to deflate whereas most sourdough breads usually hold up and need some real back and forth to get through. I was worried this meant the crust wouldn't be chewy and the crumb would be weak. However I shouldn't have worried; the crumb was incredible. Slightly tacky to feel and gloriously holey, showing the amazing hydration that this loaf has. The tang of sourdough ferment hits the nose, and my slice just begged for a slather of butter and a direct road straight into my face. Blimmin' heck that's a good sourdough! So beautifully soft and light yet chewy. The loaf is a big boy, this is the kind where you'd have to cut a slice in half just so it can fit in the toaster. Its so difficult not to polish a loaf like this off in one sitting, so I'm glad it's big, means there's enough to keep for tomorrow. I suppose.
The focaccias are a tale of two cities. You can see from the pictures the difference in the bake on both of them. I must preface this by saying that both of them taste incredible. The rosemary & sea salt (top pic) is aromatic, heady and the salt melts on the tongue as you bite into the bread, and the caramelised onion & goats cheese (second pic) is the perfect marriage of creamy, lactic (not overly strong) goats cheese tanginess with sweet, soft onions. But unfortunately the onion & goats cheese focaccia eclipsed the rosemary & sea salt one. The latter felt a little over-baked and under-proved. The crumb structure was slightly dense. Still delicious but just slightly missing the mark. The onion & goats cheese though, was exactly as this Italian bread should be. It was crisp on the bottom and top with a perfect springy mattress of pockets in the crumb. I could eat a lot of that without anything else! I'd say that this focaccia was the best thing in the whole bundle....or the sourdough...…oh wait..... I don't know, tough call!
After this, we tried the sweet treats. Both the chocolate brioche and the cinnamon bun were sweet, light and sublime. There was no oily dough and gooey centres to the cinnamon buns (compared with the flakey pastry and gooey centres of the cinnamon buns from Apsley Bakehouse); instead its a gentle fragrant sweet cinnamon swirled expertly within a wonderful sweet enriched dough. The chocolate brioche doesn't look like much, but the chocolate runs through the bouncy, buttery dough evenly and balances out the sweetness with a perfect cocoa bitterness. Can I eat this for breakfast? I'm not sure, but I know that I want to.
The next day -because we were pacing ourselves you see!- we tried the bagels. We loaded them up with smashed avocado and some wonderful thick-cut, free-range streaky bacon. We're both a fan of the chewy, dense bagels rather than doughy, fluffy ones. We like to work for our food you see, and when there's a chewy bagel it's almost like eating celery...where the effort exerted to chew matches the calories taken in by eating it. Right? The bagels from Union were kind of in the middle for us. They had a great dense crumb, a beautiful smooth shiny crust showing they were well boiled, and were flavoursome but lacked the chewy texture of a New York bagel. That's just personal preference though, they were still a wonderful comforting vehicle for my avo and bacon.
One should never compare, but the delivery of baked goods to our door does obviously draw comparisons with Apsley Bakehouse . The latter, certainly excels in the vienoisserie (posh word for things like croissants and pain au chocolat) little treats, and patisserie arena. But there's one hundred percent room for both companies at our front door as Union truly excel at the bakery staples you'd want in your pantry every single day.
Now we have found Union coffee and Sourdough, while I could continue to bake my own bread every week, why would I ever need to again? These ladies are seriously talented. Their products are well developed, perfectly made and showcase a real passion and finesse. It was an absolute honour to review these products and we cannot wait to place more orders.
Service: All the bread is made to order, which means it takes a minimum of two business days to process. There are two delivery days are Tuesdays (order by Sunday 11am) and Saturdays (order by Thursday 11am).
Flavia and Gabriela are really friendly and helpful if you need a bit of guidance on what to order.
Value and Price: Free delivery over £10 is great, £2 if under seems reasonable too. Most of the items come as a pack of six for around £4-6, my only slight niggle is ordering six of a sweet item is a bit of a commitment, as they'll need to eaten in a couple of days or frozen. The bigger items like the Focaccia and sourdough loaves are around £5. It's a bit on the costly side, but they're sizeable!
Quality: Absolutely top notch. It's hugely impressive that Union Coffee and Dough can offer a big menu without letting the quality drop.
Overall: OUTSTANDING - Staples have never tasted so good. This will become a regular supply run for us and we'd recommend it does for you too!
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