Meet Stephanie Nye creator of Farmers Market Inspired Soups

14 years ago, central coast native and Cal Poly alumni Stephanie Nye did her first farmers market with vegan soup, and ever since she has been in the kitchen cooking up the soups that Harvestly customers know and love.

Stephanie started her first vegan restaurant with little cooking experience but a passion for the community and sourcing local. She sold her vegan restaurant, Shine cafe in Morro Bay because she felt that while running a business it was almost impossible to source everything locally and focus on the food.

“I wanted to really simplify the business and really be able to utilize the local farmer’s products a lot better and have the time to do that,” Nye said. “I really wanted to simplify the food aspect of the food business.”

Below is a Q&A with Stephanie. Read more to learn about her and her business.

What got you to start making vegan soup/food?

I myself, I'm not a vegan, I'm vegetarian but I have had periods in my life where I am full vegan. My dad had health problems that kind of forced him into a certain diet. He has since recovered but has kept a lot of those aspects of the way he eats. He's not vegan, but when he was at his worst, that's the way he had to eat. All of my training is in vegan food and it aligned with where he was at that point. I built a following based on vegan food, so I think that people saw me and knew that if that was the way they ate, that they could trust that that's what they were getting from me. So I haven't really branched out from vegan because of that. Also, the more research I do with vegan eating, it seems to be the way we all need to eat for the environment and for our own bodies. 

What has your experience been like working with the central coast community?

I mean, amazing. I'm a central coast, local, I went to Cal Poly. This community is a one-of-a-kind community, it's so receptive to young people trying to do something different. The community just surrounds you and supports you, and wants you to grow, and wants you to succeed. My experience with San Luis Obispo County has just been so phenomenal as far as the support aspect. 

What is your favorite part about what you do? 

I love the customer service aspect of it. I love meeting new people and learning about their food allergies, and knowing how to cater to them. I like to really do a personal touch on everything that I do. More recently, I have just fallen in love all over again with being in the kitchen. Probably because of COVID and having to isolate and not having the anxiety of public service right now, just being in the kitchen and having my headphones on and listening to an audiobook or a podcast and cooking these soups. It's my happy place, it really is. 

What makes you and your soups unique? 

I have all my own recipes. I don't come from a cooking family. It's not like my grandma's recipes. When I bought the restaurant, I really didn't know how to cook, but I learned really quickly that it was a passion and it was a calling and I was good at it. Watching people eat my food was just the most heartwarming feeling. It is such a gift that someone can give you when they like your food. I think that's what makes it unique, it's all me, it's something that I've created all on my own and been able to make a living at. 

What do you want your customers to know about you and your business? 

I just want them to know how much I care about what I put into every single food and that I never take for granted how fortunate I am to have my own business, and that every single one of my customers is contributing to my happiness and the way of life that I truly love. I'm so thankful to every single one of them and I want them to come here and tell me their stories and what has brought them to the booth and how I can help them make their experience better in any way I can. 

Where do you see yourself and your business in the future?

I'm all about slow growth, you know, it's how I've lived my life, in all aspects of life. Having Harvestly has definitely grown my business more. I've been able to reach out into the community deeper than I've ever been able to with the farmers’ market. But I know any growth that will occur will be very small. I just think that there's such a lack of people who are willing to stay small. Everybody thinks that they need to hire a bunch of employees and grow into this huge thing. But I really think that happiness can be found more so when you keep everything simple. 

Click to get Stephanie’s soups delivered straight to your door with Harvestly.co: https://harvestly.co/vendors/s...

Wild Bread Co. started about 6 years ago when Christina Bailey-DeMille and Nelson DeMille decided to leave  their corporate jobs and buy one-way tickets to Europe. They knew that their jobs were not the right fit and they needed a change of pace. They spent the next few months traveling and becoming immersed in food and culture, typically opting for staying in people's homes rather than hotels or rental homes. 

“We’ve always had a passion for food and when traveling to new places it just felt like that universal language and the thing that can bring everyone together,” Christina said.

Throughout their travels, they found a work away program in Wales on a small town organic farm doing produce boxes. There they learned how to make bread from one of the owners of the farm. This bread was the best they had ever tasted and the ingredients were so simple. Christina and Nelson started to think to themselves, “How come the bread in America doesn’t taste like this” and “ Why does every bread in the store have all of these crazy ingredients.” 

They learned the ancient tradition and process of naturally leavened bread in hopes of being able to make their own starter and bread when they got home. Creating a business out of it wasn’t even on their mind. 

About 5 months later, they came home and built starters in their house mixing flour and water and feeding it until it became what they were looking for. 

At this point they were just giving loaves to their friends and family and the owner of Harmony House yoga in Pismo Beach found out about their bread and asked them to come and sell it at her maker's market. 

“We just decided to give it a shot. We made 20 loaves which was a huge production for us and we sold out in less than 20 minutes,” Christina and Nelson said. “We also got the opportunity to sample our bread and get some great feedback moving forward.” 

After their debut at the makers market, they got a permanent spot selling at the yoga studio on Saturday mornings. As they got busier and busier, they decided to pursue their business full time and really created Wild Bread Co., bringing you the most delicious and nutritious breads using the ancient method of bread making that yields far more complex flavors and superior digestibility.

Below is a Q&A with Christina and Nelson. Read more to learn about Wild Bread Co..

What were some of the biggest challenges creating your business/product

“One challenge will always be identifying when it's time to make the next jump and I think for a while  we've been pretty conservative with it. We funded it ourselves and the money we were making went right back into the business to grow it. Just like we learned how to make bread ourselves we kind of self taught ourselves how to run a little business. You go into it because you love making bread but you have to do all these other things and we’ve had to figure it out as we go which is challenging but also kind of really fun.” 

How did you and your business get to where you are today

“First and foremost I would say Kelly from Harmony House Yoga because she was really the first person that encouraged us to sell our bread and gave us the maker's market to try it. Jerry Rutiz from Rutiz farms also really helped us get our start by allowing us to sell at his farm stand and introduced us to the right kind of customers, similar to Harvestly, local people that care about what they put in their bodies and they want to support local food producers. With Harmony House and Rutiz we put a lot of energy into connecting with our customers and giving out samples which created a strong word of mouth in the community. I think one thing that has opened a lot of doors for us is that we are both from this area so we have a big network of family and friends that are all rooting for us. It gave us a lot of opportunities in the community to really have our 5 minutes to show what we can do and then it had legs and took off from there with the customers.”

What do you envision for you and your business for the coming future

“I think for us we’ve let it kind of grow organically and that is something that we like. People always say ‘maybe someday we’ll see your product in Trader Joe’s or something like that’ and that’s definitely not the route that we are looking for. I think we really like being a part of the community and making that footprint a lot smaller. We want to provide bread to everyone in our community, not necessarily to everyone across the world. We like being on the smaller side of things and focusing on the local area but there is definitely room to grow.”

“There’s more people in the community that would appreciate our product and the organic approach that haven’t heard about us yet. In the next year we plan to put more effort towards marketing and partnerships. We do plan on growing in the community but the business is based in sourdough so we can say confidently that we will only be producing sourdough based products. In the world of sourdough there are a lot of possibilities of products, and the sourdough process has many benefits in terms of health and flavor. Any way the business goes, that would always be true.”

What would you like your customers to know about you and your business

“We feel really lucky to do what we do and it’s really impactful for us knowing we get to play a little role in people coming together over food. We are both self described foodies and getting together at our parents house or at a friends house; food is a vehicle to bring people together and have that positive human connection and enjoy eachothers company. It really brings us a lot of joy to have the opportunity to make bread for the community and in our hearts we know it end up at a dinner party and people get to enjoy it.”

Get Wild Bread products delivered to your door on Harvestly.co!