About

With a single rack of fresh bread and a shoebox for a cash register, Wendy Smith Born and James Barrett launched Metropolitan Bakery in 1993. Years later, what began as an “experiment” between two friends—one a restaurant manager, the other a pastry chef—has grown into a Philadelphia institution.

Wendy and James met while working at Philly’s legendary The White Dog Café, which, like the West Coast’s Chez Panisse, was one of the pioneering institutions of the “buy local” movement. During their time at White Dog, the two friends often lamented how difficult it was to find breads of the quality they’d tasted in Europe.

James’ culinary training includes the Culinary Institute of America and a stint at the Ecole Francaise de Boulangerie d’Aurillac in France, which helped him refine the techniques of old-world baking first learned in the kitchen of his Italian grandmother. These experiences and years of trial and error impressed upon him the importance of natural ingredients, traditional methods, and above all, patience, in producing great breads.

The artisan baking process is a slow one. It takes up to two weeks for the natural yeast (made from fermented grapes and figs) to mature, and then another 48 hours for the dough to be mixed, shaped, pounded, left to rise in rye-dusted willow baskets, and then baked in steam-injected, stone-deck ovens. It’s this painstaking process that produces the intense, earthy flavors, crackling crusts, and complex textures of artisanal breads. (Breads produced this way are better for you, too… they offer more nutrients and are more easily digested.)

But Metropolitan Bakery has become more than just a great bakery; it’s part of the community. Because of Wendy and James’s belief that jobs are the best way out of poverty, the bakery employs and trains recent parolees, mentors at-risk high school students, and is a co-sponsor of the new H.O.M.E. Page Café in the Free Library, which employs formerly homeless Philadelphians and raises money for Project H.O.M.E. The bakery also donates bread to shelters every week. And because supporting local farmers and purveyors is so important, Metropolitan’s five Philadelphia shops offer locally made jams, cheeses, spreads and other specialties, and the 19th street store is a pick-up location for community-supported agriculture.

Recent Tweets

• Congrats to Swarthmore Co-Op for winning "Best Local Foods" from Main Line Today. Read More »
• We're in for FEASTIVAL on Sept 15 Read More »
• Arrrgh! Starbucks just announced it has 10 million Facebook fans. We need to catch up, help us here. Read More »
• Today's hand pie is a sweet one - blueberry. Available at 19th street for $3.60each.
• Recipe of the Month for July is summer in a bowl. Read More »