Firebrand Artisan Breads

(Not closed, my girlfriend and I went there this morning, and it was amazing!).
Everything about this bakery is 5 stars. The food is fresh and never stale. There is a wide spectrum of baked goods, ranging from sweet, to just bread, to savory.
The price is nice too. Averages around 4 bucks an item, unless you buy a loaf of bread.
The ambiance is great. Wide open seating with lots of Windows. Smells like fresh bread, and you can actually see the bread making process as it is set up right behind the counter.
The bakers are great too. Lively if you feel like a conversation, and right too it if you just want to get your stuff and go.
Although their stuff is great, my favorite was the bread pudding. I wanted to just let it melt in my mouth!
May not be for everyone, but it is inviting, fairly affordable, unique, and tasty!

As they say, these brick oven baked delights are «slap yo grandmama good»!
They had a sample of the pretzel sticky bun on the counter. I was so inspired with one bite I was very nearly brought to tears. So yes, a sticky bun joined a loaf of their amazing sourdough batard, a blueberry vanilla scone and a gruyère croissant in a box along with and some delicious coffee.
Oh yeah — BAD place if you are on a New Year’s diet. GREAT place if you are a baked goods aficionado. Get yourself in here and find your newest yeast-​driven obsession.

Great space, located in the hive. I got an almond croissant $ 4. Didn’t think it was anything special and definitely overpriced.
I will return earlier in the day for better selection and update my review. Fingers crossed.

Amazing! Clean, spacious and fabulous! Bread and coffee… Delicious! The staff… Friendly… The customer services is over the top! Looooove this place!

BACON. FOUGASSE. It’s like heaven in my mouth. Scratch that… It IS heaven in my mouth. I usually don’t even like bacon, but hot damn! I would weigh 1000 lbs and sweat bacon grease if I worked there.
I order their products through the grocery delivery company Good Eggs. Pretzels and pretzel bombs are to die for. Haven’t tried any of their actual bread but I plan to!
Keep up the awesome work, guys! And if you ever go out of business I will cry hard, greasy bacon tears of sadness and beg at your feet for the recipe.

The rye bread is amazing. I’ve been getting it at Temescal Farmer’s Market. I try to limit myself to one loaf every 2 – 3 weeks. Sometimes I fail because it’s so delicious. Keep it in the paper bag inside a sealed gallon-​size ziplock bag and it stays beautifully fresh for nearly a week!

I’ve gotten the italian donuts from them in the past at my farmers market and enjoyed them, so I thought I’d give their breads a try too. I ordered a whole wheat baguette and made the huge mistake of not inspecting it before I got home. Completely burnt. It doesn’t just look burnt, it tastes burnt — the crust tastes of charred ash. It’s terrible and completely inedible.
Stick to the pastries if you do give them a try.

OK, those pretzels are the FUCKING BOMB. Here’s how to take them to the next level:
(1) Assuming you’re buying them at the store, WAIT until you get home before you start eating them! Be patient!
(2) Make a couple dips for them. I suggest French’s yellow mustard in one bowl, and another bowl with that cheap liquid «cheese» like you get on ballpark nachos. (You can find a jar of it at any random liquor store.)
(3) Reheat the pretzels in a toaster oven for a few mins @ 400 degrees.
(4) Serve with a big frosty mug of your favorite beer.
Good lord that is downright decadent!

I’ve been ordering from Good Eggs, and one of the staff recommends was Firebrand Artisan Breads «Golden Raisin & Fennel Baguette». The photos looked amazing, and it sounded delicious, so I ordered it.
Instead of one of the amazing looking baguettes I’d seen in their photos, I received a baguette so burnt that even the flour dusting on it was burnt! Top, sides, bottom — all of it was covered in blackened areas. I thought maybe it looked worse than it tasted, but the crust was completely inedible unless you appreciate the taste of charcoal in your mouth. I had to toss the entire thing.
What really shocked and surprised me was that someone at Firebrand must have seen this baguette (and likely others) were burnt and still thought it’d be okay to throw it in a bag and serve it to a paying customer. (Who does that?! I’d rather you just cancel my order and say sorry you had an oven problem and couldn’t meet the order.)
So I wrote Good Eggs, and they apologized and offered to send me a baguette for free.
I waited a week and then ordered the same baguette. It, too, arrived burnt (though not as badly), but the bottom of it is mostly burnt. Any golden raisin touching the bottom is black and way past the «caramelized» stage.
I don’t understand how this place stays in business and has so many good reviews. If they’re known for bread, how can they stay in business when they keep delivering clearly burnt bread?
With how expensive their baguettes are, they better be perfect, and my experience so far has been laughable. I’d rather get a baguette from Trader Joe’s than this place.

Best pretzel outside of Germany. The saltiness and texture is spot-​on. I’m looking forward to trying more from here. Blue bottle carries them if you need a morning bite too.

Reminds me of bread from France. This is what we need in the Bay Area and San Francisco.

The best breads in the Bay Area. By far.

This bread is truly amazing. I like the kalamata olive baguette. I hope they can maintain the quality as the demand grows.

Memories!
There was a small brick oven wood fire bakery in the town where I grew up and the Firebrand whole wheat loaf brought back their wonderfulness. I hope that these folks find their market and prosper.

I learned a lot about wood fired brick oven bread since my first review of Firebrand Artisan bakery. Matt, the owner, is very passionate about his craft, and truly cares about his customers. Matt made a few pretzels for me, and I went by the bakery to pick them up. They were much improved over the ones I purchased 10 days ago, and now I can say they are the real deal! :) Apparently the problem had to do with the type of parchment paper that was used on the previous batch.
I was also very fortunate to have chosen to drop by on the day Matt bakes new items for the farmers market, and he set aside a couple of sweet pastries and two loaves of bread for me to try.
I had a couple of errands to run, and left the bag of bread in the car. Every time I got in the car, I wondered «what is that nice smoky smell?» Turns out that Matt uses almond and walnut wood, and there is a delicious hint of it baked into the crusts.
So, the sourdough bread is like the very best bread that you might eat too much of in a nice restaurant. The hot brick oven totally seals the crust, and the inside is incredibly and surprisingly light and delicate, yet holds up to being spread with butter. You have to use a good sharp serrated bread knife to slice it. It’s a very good bread, the kind I might have for dinner with assorted cheeses and a glass of wine, and that would be all that I need or want. Same goes for the golden raisin fennel baguette. I have enough of that baguette left over, that I will make a bread pudding out of it.
Let’s talk about Matt’s pastries! OMG — the spiced poached pear and almond financier was perfect — soooo delicious! Please make more! Last, but not least, was a pretzel sticky bun… also incredibly delicious and chewy, swirled with just the right amount of cinnamon, currants, and a generous amount of pecans on top.
Matt is definitely a creative and talented baker, who wants to get everything just right. It’s worth trying.

Quality brick oven breads brought to Oakland. Previously getting brick oven breads required finding Marin’s Brickmaiden or Sonoma’s Wild Flour, but now the revolution (or should we say reversion?) has come to Alameda. Their standard breads are crusty and hearty. The pretzels are flavorful and chewy. The bacon fougasse seems like it has a strip of bacon in every bite. The only item I’m not too fond of are the baguettes, which are probably not ideal for brick ovens because you end up with all crust.

Their bacon fougasse is the crack of breads. Buy two because you’ll eat the first one on the drive home or get it delivered to your house by Good Egg.

Firebrand bakes bread in a brick oven. pricing is 2 – 3 normal price of breads/​baguettes.
locale: kensington farmers market (⁵⁄₅)
offerings: baguettes, breads (4.5) pastries (5 ish)
eats: pretzel (1.75)
–made without sourdough?
–taste unique, not bread like
–would try other baked items someday.
crumbs:
–usually does wholesale,
–bakery same area as starter bakery.
–didn’t see any samples.

Remember those delicious Bacon Gruyère Brioches from Blue Bottle? The ones I raved about in my Blue Bottle review, more than I raved about the actual coffee (which I still consider my favorite in the city). The brioches that, upon discontinuation by someone at Blue Bottle who I still think made a grave error in judgment, was asked by yours truly more than 5x, «Whyyyyyyyyy?» in a tone that could only be described as whiny-​pathetic-​disappointment?
This is where they hail from.
‘Nuff said.
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(The brioches are only available in wholesale quantity from these brilliant bread-​crafters, but you can call them to find out where to find them near you.)

After my previous review, the owner Matt contacted me via Unilocal,and said:
«Hello, my name is Matt I’m the owner of Firebrand. I just saw your review on Unilocal and I’m very sorry you didn’t have a great experience with the bread. Your criticism is totally valid, since the weather has gotten hotter over here my starters have taken a beating and one is sick. I’m nursing it back to health, but the bread is way flatter and harder than I’d like. I should have it back to normal in a week. If you’d like to give us another try, you’re more than welcome to stop by or call the bakery and we can give you some bread for free, I’m always here.»
I was finally able to stop by this week, and Matt gave me another loaf of levain and some pretzel bites. The bread was much better than the previous loaf, although the crust was still a bit too toothsome and the loaf a bit too flat for me, but the flavor was great. Also, the pretzel bites were awesome, I had to restrain myself to not eat them all on the way home. I appreciate Matt’s willingness for me to give it another try, since I can’t get to Rainbow grocery too often. Really 4 ½ stars now, I think it’s comparable to Tartine’s loaf.