NORTHAMPTON, MA — Hungry Ghost Bread, best known for its small-batch wood-fired sourdough bread, recently celebrated its 20th anniversary.
The artisan bakery, founded in 2004 by Jonathan Stevens and his partner Cheryl Maffei, has expanded its shop, menu and role in Northampton. Nestled in a historic building owned by the university, the bakery has become a community hub of sorts for the city’s residents and the Smith College students, faculty and staff.
“We’re not just a place to go get some food,” said Jonathan, a six-time James Beard Award nominee. “Our bakery is a place where people hang out and talk about what’s going on in our community.”
The open shop layout spurs those interpersonal relationships with customers, which is one element of the business Jonathan attributes to Hungry Ghost’s longevity.
“I know many of my regular customers, and I have authentic relationships with them,” he said. “Many of them are remarkable and interesting people, and I want to know what’s going on in their lives. Maybe their parents are ill, maybe their grandkids are off to college, but I’m actually interested, and that’s created a lot of connections.”
In addition to the open layout, the bakery also has an amphitheater, which recently housed its 20th Anniversary Bread Festival.
Hungry Ghost produces about a dozen different kinds of bread, ranging from classic French loaves to seasonal varieties such as cranberry bread. Customers can also find the herbs grown in the medicinal garden in front of the bakery in products such as a white rosemary loaf. The bakery also benefits from the use of locally milled flour produced at Ground Up Grain in Holyoke, MA, which is delivered weekly.
Though artisan bread is the core of the business, customers also drop in to indulge in the pastry offerings ranging from cookies to handheld pies.
Over the years, the bakery operation has grown from Jonathan, Cheryl and their kids to a staff of 14, which includes a dedicated pastry department. Yet from the beginning, the pair has committed to offering its employees a living wage, which is another aspect of the business that has allowed it to flourish for two decades.
“One of the biggest challenges in the food industry is staff turnover and training people,” he said, noting that offering pay above the minimum wage creates trust in a bakery team. “You have to pay them as if you trust them, even if you don’t know them yet because that’s the gesture that’s going to make them trust you, stick around and feel like they’re being valued.”
From his lessons in starting and owning a bakery as well as crafting sourdough bread, Jonathan recently released The Hungry Ghost Bread Book, which features a foreword from Richard Miscovich, a certified bread baker and three-term member of the Bread Bakers Guild of America board of directors.
In addition to Jonathan’s insights on sourdough starters and an array of recipes, the book also offers small-scale bakery owners insights on how to use natural fermentation to improve the nutritional value of wheat and elevate product offerings.
“Small business owners are overwhelmed,” he said, “… but at the same time, I’m hoping to gently recommend some of the more thorough approaches that we’ve been able to develop to the ones that have enough headspace to think about the quality of their product and what they may or may not be doing.”
Jonathan also aims for the book to open the door for consulting work, which would allow him to help businesses such as schools and conference centers improve the nutrition and flavor content of baked goods through natural fermentation.
“Our job is to feed our neighbors and to get as much nutrition and flavor out of the grain by using clean water, natural fermentation and just a little bit of salt,” he concluded. “That’s all it takes to make good bread.”
