ACE Bakery - Putting the Art in Artisanal

There’s a small eatery near where I work, called Porta Via, that makes me feel like I do after a yoga class (the rare times I go) – clean, healthy and virtuous bordering on smug. Today while ordering my roasted veggie panini and side salad duo, I noticed a flyer stating that Porta Via gets their artisan bread “freshly delivered at 5 a.m. every morning from ACE Bakery.”

Imagine my surprise, since ACE Bakery is a JustFoodERP customer I was familiarizing myself with the other day, as a new employee here and the person responsible for writing up case studies of our customers. Having now consumed their multigrain fresh artisan bread for my workday lunch, I can say –  first-hand – that they are a premier bakery!

Founded in 1993 by a husband-and-wife team in Caledon, Ontario (beautiful countryside where I too have resided, just north of Toronto), ACE Bakery has expanded to include white and sourdough, grain, sweet and savory artisan breads, artisan granola, artisan crisps, and Kosher and organic certified breads. They are carried by hundreds of grocery stores, speciality food shops, restaurants, hotels, caterers and airlines in Canada, the U.S. and Caribbean. ACE Bakery is also known for their donations to food and nutrition programs for low-income citizens, financing culinary scholarships, and supporting organic farming initiatives.

I didn’t know much about “artisan” style bread, so I read up on it. Technically it means bread made primarily by hand, not machine, but an interesting article on FreshJuice, a site about healthy eating, notes that “artisanal is the hottest bakery buzzword right now and there’s no regulatory agency determining who can and can’t stamp it on their products.”

Linda Haynes, cofounder of ACE Bakery, is quoted as saying “even pizza parlors and chains in the U.S. are using it.” She suggests that you check the ingredients on the packaging – “there shouldn’t be many items listed, and there should not be any words you don’t know” – then check out the breadmaker’s website to learn their baking methods. ACE Bakery starts at 3 a.m. when the baker arrives to mix the dough… go here to learn more on how ACE artisan bread is made.

The ACE website also describes their rustic breads as having “more flavor, a richer color, a chewy moist texture and a satisfying crisp crust.” Yup, yup , yup and yup for my sandwich today at Porta Via!

Heather Angus-Lee

With a background in trade journalism, including a long stint as editor of a national manufacturing magazine, Heather Angus-Lee is the marketing writer for IndustryBuilt Software. When she isn’t turning our customer implementations into delightful stories, she can be found hiking with her three large dogs or reading. Heather can be reached at heather.angus-lee@industrybuilt.com.