A WOMAN who started her business after finding a love for baking sourdough while battling an eating disorder is set to host a physical pop-up shop.
Black Cat Bakes, a company specialising in sourdough goods, is coming to School Road, Copford, in a pop-up shop on Saturday.
All sorts of goods such as cheddar and chocolate sourdough and even vanilla and cinnamon sourdoughnuts will all be available from 9.30am to 12.30pm.
Ayala Daisley, the owner of Black Cat Bakes in Wivenhoe, is excited to have a shop where people can walk in and look around.
She said: "This is the first pop-up we've done. Up till now, we've operated through private orders for delivery as well as supplying a number of local shops."
Black Cat Bakes supplies Fields Farm Shop, Colcheco, River Colne Deli, Love Local and Crouch Street Bakes with loads of unique products.
Ayala said: "I'm excited and nervous about the pop-up shop. It's a really important step as we hope to find a permanent bricks-and-mortar premises for our bakery soon.
"I started Black Cat Sourdough in August 2020, when everyone was getting into sourdough during lockdown.
"It spiralled really quickly, and we've been trying to keep up ever since. For me, baking was a project I undertook to help me challenge my eating disorder.
"For so long I'd avoided carbs and made myself really unwell. My therapist thought this was a good way to challenge the rules I'd built around food."
Ayala says sourdough has lots of health benefits and is healthier than normal run-of-the-mill bread.
She said: "Sourdough is a process where bread is made using a 'sourdough starter' to make the dough rise.
"The starter is a live culture of yeasts and bacteria, which are found on the surface of grains, and end up in the flour.
"They work slowly, which means it takes days to make a sourdough loaf. Mass-produced bread instead uses additives to make the bread rise - it's an ultra-processed, fast food.
"It is also more nutritious because the sourdough helps to break down phytic acid, a chemical in food which inhibits the body's ability to absorb key nutrients like calcium and iron.
"I'm really passionate about using this old method to make bread, and the health benefits it may confer."
For more information go to www.blackcatbakes.co.uk.
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