FEATURED VENDOR: The Farmhouse Bakery and CREAMERY!!

Passing several gentle, free-range laying hens, I ventured up the walk to see the new Creamery at The Farmhouse Bakery for the first time, with Don MacLean singing goodbye to “American Pie” as an intoxicating smell reeled me in. “Ok, I should go on these visits more often – This is my kind of place!”

Some interviews are easy but formulaic – you go with a preconceived set of questions, they give you answers, you move along, job done. Not so at the home of Carmen and Jonathan White – I left my husband and garage covered in grease and truck parts, our four homeschoolers busy working while the toddler napped, and put zero prep into what we’d talk about – when I asked Carmen where we should start, she laughed, shrugged, and spread her hands around to show her beautiful new work space – sounds good! Let’s start with, What the heck is that delicious smell!! Lucky for me, and my taste buds, it was her homemade caramel sauce that she’d soon add to several of her ice cream varieties, including Cookie Dough Caramel Swirl, now on the Market!!

She may be famous locally for the bakery goods and sweets she’s been selling only since 2017, but Carmen initially met Jonathan when they both worked at The Four Seasons in Phoenix, Arizona. Having recently received her four-year Bachelor of Culinary Arts degree in Mexico City, Carmen began an 18 month internship at the Hotel where Jonathan worked. It must have been fate, because when given the option of her required internship in Phoenix or Spain, she wanted Spain! She wasn’t comfortable speaking English, but her options were to learn our complicated language almost overnight, or pay an obscene amount of money for the necessary visas and plane fare to Spain, much further from home – so thank goodness for us and Jonathan she wisely chose learning English and moving to Arizona!

Fast forward a few years, with both working at The Ritz-Carlton in Naples, Florida. Carmen started in pastries and then jumped into homemade ice creams and gelato, as Jonathan managed the Lounge and Ice Cream/Gelato Shop where folks from all over the world would visit the hotel and tell Jonathan Carmen’s frozen treats were the best they’d ever had. Anywhere. That’s when he knew they had something special, and the dream of a Creamery followed them thru the years, until they moved back to Jonathan’s hometown of Troy.

Ironic that while Carmen explained how they were focused on keeping their new frozen desserts labels “clean”, Lynard Skynard sang about being a “Simple Man” in the background. When bigger companies add name-brand, store-bought cookies to Cookies ‘n Cream ice cream, the ingredient list grows too long with unpronounceable, unhealthy additives – So Carmen and Jonathan focus on homemade brownies, cookies, and caramel, plus farm fresh milk, eggs and fruit, to set their frozen treats apart from anything else you’ll find. Even their mint chocolate ice cream is only flavored (to perfection!) with mint leaves from their own plants – the color is even more vibrant than you’d believe natural could be, without any artificial colorings!

Often you can look at an ingredient list to know what a product contains – that same list, however, doesn’t begin to describe the care that goes into products such as the White’s create. Just starting up a Creamery business with today’s nightmarish regulations could have been a herculean task, but Jonathan knew they had to take it a step further. Simply purchasing a high end, Italian ice cream/sorbet/gelato maker wasn’t enough. They wanted their products to stand out because you’d taste the farm-freshness of the ingredients – raw milk they’d pick up as soon as it was out of the cows, freshly laid brown eggs, vine-ripened fruits – and they were willing to jump all the extra hurdles to become a Licensed Dairy Plant, legally allowed to take those fresh ingredients to their Troy creamery! Amazing.

It’s no joke that every person I’ve ever met who knew Carmen well, and had watched her work, all initially used the exact same adjective to describe her – hard working – and for good reason. When I teasingly asked if she ever got to take a break, she laughed, “Only if I’m good – sometimes I even sleep til 6 or 7am until my body protests and says, Get up! Get up!” When she was describing both her and Jonathan’s crazy work schedule back in their Naples days at The Ritz, I asked, “So only time for Hi and Bye if your work hours never matched up?” She nodded, saying they literally met in the parking lot to pass Baby Emma’s carseat carrier back and forth as one went in to work and the other took the baby home. What a far cry from now being so close to having a home business where they can work fulltime, side by side each day!

Carmen’s smile is as infectious as her confections – same with Jonathan’s passionate nature, whether discussing his talented wife or their current and future dreams for the business, which include the 18 fruit trees planted around their beautiful homestead which will go into both their creamery and bakery products. Each day getting closer to him working full time from their home business only sweetens their already delicious days and plans. And their three young, energetic children are working on fitting, funny names for each ice cream flavor – with a family business this sweet, everyone wants to be involved, starting as the best tasters around!

Hands down best part of my afternoon? It happened to be the very first time they’d ever made Gelato, and ignorant me didn’t even know how it was different from ice cream until I put it in my mouth. I’ve never tasted anything that velvety. I thought Jonathan had to be joking, that the creamy gelato I was savoring is actually lower in fat and calories than ice cream, but he insists it’s true, due to the higher milk and lower cream content – the secret is in the amount of air and the speed with which it’s churned. His comment after the first taste? “That’s everything I hoped it’d be, and more! It’s exciting to think we’ll introduce people to gelato for their first time!”

Stay tuned for Part Two of their Creamery Story, as we learn the craziness it took to find a licensed local dairy supplier, meet Carmen’s new intern, and their newest drool-worthy flavors, as well as their plans for the future!

Over the past decade, our travels have taken us on interviews, workshops, farm tours, and field days to almost 100 farms and businesses, yet only a rare handful were so genuine I was made to feel not just welcome, but part of the family – and that’s the feeling with which I came away from The Farmhouse Bakery and Creamery. I respect their deep-rooted commitment to not only quality products but truly fresh products with all the local ingredients possible – you want to cheer them and support them on their passionate, dedicated way, even before you’ve tasted their Gelato (but trust me, even more so after)!