Best Artisan Bread: Madruga Bakery

At Madruga Bakery, bread begins before the dough is mixed. The bakery mills its own flour from heirloom wheat berries on a 26-inch stone mill, uses naturally leavened dough and relies on long, slow fermentation before loaves reach its stone hearth. In a world of shortcuts, Madruga has chosen the long way around, and that commitment to the craft is exactly what makes the bread special.

The ingredients sound almost impossibly simple: flour, water and salt. What happens to them is anything but. Madruga mills grain only hours before using the flour and works with heirloom wheat sourced from sustainable farms. Time, temperature, fermentation and the stone hearth then do their part, producing rustic loaves with the darker crust and developed flavor that have become signatures of the bakery.

Bread may be the foundation, but Madruga gives Gableites plenty of other reasons to arrive early. Croissants include plain, chocolate, almond and chocolate-hazelnut versions, alongside seasonal Danish, guava and cheese pastries, scones, muffins, cookies, brownies and other baked goods. Breakfast and lunch bring sandwiches, quiche, salads and seasonal dishes, with much of the menu naturally returning to the bakery’s own bread.

There is also something particularly satisfying about being able to see the craft. Madruga designed its kitchen and mill with open sight lines, allowing customers to watch the process that normally happens out of view. It reinforces the sense that this is a working bakery rather than simply a café that happens to sell bread.

For milling its own flour, working with heirloom grains and treating a loaf of bread as a craft worth doing properly, Madruga Bakery is the Coral Gables Gazette’s selection for Best Artisan Bread.