Vegan bakery in talks with big grocery chains

CLEVELAND, Tenn. — A small vegan bakery within the Cleveland-Bradley Business Incubator is slowly rising to the top.

In the more than two years that Complete Choice Bakery has been operating, it has increased its product line from three items to 20 and is now in negotiations with several large grocery chains to distribute its products nationwide, owner Dante Santana said.

Locally, Santana’s breads, cookies, pastries and wheat sticks are distributed in several stores, including Earth Fare and Whole Foods.

“We really want to serve the vegan population,” he said, “and assure them we always use the best ingredients.”

Veganism is a strict form of vegetarianism that excludes the consumption of any animal products — including eggs and dairy. Since most baking traditionally includes those two ingredients, creating tasty baked goods that adhere to vegan ideals can be a little tricky, Santana said.

That’s why he recently hired a pastry chef, who is helping to bulk up his line of gourmet desserts.

Emily Stone, a recent graduate of Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta, has been working as Complete Choice’s pastry chef for about a month and is still learning her way around vegan baking. She said she spends most of her time experimenting, trying to recreate traditional flavors.

“It’s a completely new thing for me,” she said. “It’s a whole new side of baking, because to me, baking has always been about eggs and dairy.”

Products from Complete Choice have zero trans fat and use ingredients such as tofu, carob and soy milk to create what Santana refers to as “the Mercedes Benz of vegan pastries.”

With the addition of a new freezer and an extra 1,000 square feet of workspace, Santana’s bakery is positioned to increase its production, he said. The freezer will briefly store desserts, allowing the fresh items to be transported more easily and for longer distances, and the workspace is being used as a bagging and storage area for the nine types of bread the bakery produces.

Even as the bakery expands, Santana does not want to lose sight of the reason for business: to provide people with healthy options.

Bakery workers Mindy Vanderoef and Hahna McGrath, who are both vegan, said it’s often difficult to find prepared foods.

Instead of painstakingly reading through the ingredients list to ensure a food is suitable for consumption, they are able to eat anything made at the bakery without worry, they said.

“It’s just so much easier,” McGrath said. “I usually have to make my own food, and I’ve never baked anything this good. Plus, I feel like we’re helping to put the mission out there of a more healthy way of living.”