What started as an effort to simply make healthier baked goods at home has blossomed into a growing business for one local woman.
Gourmet Grain is a clean ingredient micro-bakery located in Nocatee. Melissa Cancio only uses the highest quality ingredients in her bakery. Her baked goods have no dyes, additives or shortcuts. She uses flour imported from Italy, which is minimally processed, making it healthier than the flour from the United States. She also bakes sourdough, which has a lot of health benefits due to its fermentation process. She specializes in bagels and sells a variety of mouthwatering breads and sweet treats. Her customers rave about how each baked good is as wholesome as it is delicious.
“Better ingredients should taste better,” she said.
“Gourmet Grain really started from my love of cooking, baking and making things from scratch,” Cancio continued. “Once I started making homemade bread and understanding fermentation, ingredients and flour quality, there was no going back.”
She noticed that using better ingredients and traditional methods lead to better baked goods. As a three-time breast cancer survivor, she became more intentional about the ingredients she used at home. Cancio said she has family members with ADHD and this also opened her eyes to the role food plays in wellness.
Cancio had no intention of starting a bakery a little over a year ago. She said it happened organically. She started recreating healthier versions of her family’s favorite foods at home using wholesome ingredients. She only baked for family and friends at first, but soon neighbors started asking if they could order. Gourmet Grain has been growing ever since.
The bakery began with artisan New York-style bagels. Then, Cancio added sourdough bread to the menu. She had baked sourdough before for her family and noticed how sourdough was quickly increasing in popularity. She said that there is a movement of people questioning overly processed food. Sourdough is the flagship of that, she explained.
“People are realizing bread does not need 14 ingredients to sit on a shelf for three weeks,” she explained. “They want food that feels more real again.”
When asked what she likes best about what she does, Cancio said she loves knowing that her baked goods get to become part of a family’s table. She is motivated to bake by hearing people say that it’s the best bread they’ve had. She puts a lot of love and care into her baking.
Gourmet Grain specializes in artisan sourdough breads, New York-style bagels, focaccia, English muffins and seasonal baked goods. They rotate specialty flavors throughout the week.
“Everything is made in small batches from my home kitchen, which allows me to focus on quality, long fermentation and freshness. Because we’re a small micro bakery, every loaf and batch is baked fresh to order rather than mass produced,” Cancio said. Imported and Italian flour is used in many of their breads and bagels and the ingredients stay fresh and simple.
Cancio also offers cooking classes and helps people to grow in confidence in their cooking and baking skills. In her classes, people learn about sourdough basics and how to make artisan breads, bakery-style cookies and pizza dough. She likes to keep the classes relaxed.
“People come to learn, but they also come to slow down a little, laugh, eat good food and realize homemade doesn’t have to feel intimidating,” she said.
“Life moves so fast now that I think people miss slowing down enough to make real food. There’s something meaningful about knowing who made your bread, what’s in it and that it was made with care instead of pulled off an assembly line,” Cancio added.
Gourmet Grain’s menu rotates weekly with limited quantities and seasonal flavors. Customers can place preorders through their website and pickup in the Nocatee area.
To learn more and place preorders, go to https://gourmet-grain.com. Follow Gourmet Grain on social media to stay up to date on weekly menus, seasonal specials, new flavors and class announcements.
