Company description

Little Hat Creek Farm is a successful diversified ecological vegetable farm and wood-fired bakery. Our beautiful five-acre property is nestled in the rural Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, close to the thriving “Brew Ridge Trail”, and abundant outdoor activities including Shenandoah National Park and Skyline Drive. We are about one hour from Lynchburg, Charlottesville, and Staunton.

 

2020 will be our seventh season; we have grown 30-40% every year selling at several fast-paced farmer’s markets. Our goal as a business is to drive change in our regional food system by forging one-on-one relationships with our community of eaters, providing them with bread and vegetables that are directly linked to the land.

 

In our fields, we use ecological farming practices on about one acre of annual vegetables. We grow dozens of varieties of vegetables, focusing on building soil health and producing nutrient-dense food for our community; we avoid chemicals. In our bakery, we specialize in using regional flours to produce naturally-leavened breads, croissants, and other pastries.

 

Our passion for regional grain motivated us to help found the Common Grain Alliance, a new non-profit that seeks to revitalize the grain economy in the Mid-Atlantic. We see ourselves as one of several businesses working together to re-regionalize grain in the Mid-Atlantic. In addition, many of our pastries use the vegetables and fruit grown on our farm, and everything is baked in a 5’x7′ wood-fired oven that is housed in a cheerful 1000 sq-ft climate-controlled bakery building on the farm. In 2019 we added monthly pizza nights and workshops that have helped to deepen our engagement with our community.

We believe that economic success is an important, and often overlooked, piece of "sustainability". But even as we are numbers people who are very focused on the bottom line, we also value family and relationships, and are willing to work extra hard to make space and time for people in both your life and ours.

 

Our team includes 2-3 full-time employees, and 1-2 part-time employees, in addition to myself, my wife, and our 2-year-old twins.

Job description

We have discovered we need a little extra help to finish out our season this year! We are ramping up a small greenhouse for winter vegetables, and have applied to several Christmas markets in northern Virginia with our baked goods. This is also the first year that we will be doing weekly farmers markets throughout the winter.

You are a good fit for our team if you love making and sharing good food and if our farm+bakery business model excites you. You can jump right in to a productive team and quickly learn your role.  We like working hard, but by bringing more people on board we aim to produce more while keeping everyone's hours reasonable and using our teams' skills appropriately. 

You will assist our baker with discreet tasks that help move production along including cleaning, dishwashing, preparation of fillings, pastry makeup, and processing fresh vegetables and fruits from our farm and others. We will train you in cool oven production, including granola, crackers, cookies, and tea cakes, all made with regional grain. You will help with Christmas production and packaging, including pain d'epice, sourdough Christstollen, Zimtsterne, Lebkuchen, and other European holiday treats. You may be asked to perform other tasks, including scaling, mixing, dividing, and shaping dough, making deliveries, helping to manage the oven fire, or feeding sourdough starters. 

This entry-level position is a great way to get your feed wet in an artisan bakery located on a small ecological vegetable farm. We prefer that you demonstrate some kitchen experience (but it doesn't have to be baking) and enjoy working with your hands.  We don't have a lot of time to bring you up to speed, so you must be able to learn new skills easily. You can anticipate tasks, see what needs to be done, and do them competently. You are organized and take pride in a clean workspace and a job well done. You are able to work quickly and efficiently while attending to detail, and you are able to problem-solve on the fly. You also don't mind working outside in any weather and enjoy physical labor. You are punctual, dependable, able to safely lift fifty pounds, and able to meet deadlines. You work well with others, but are also content to work alone.

We would like for you to start immediately. We prefer that you commit to working through the end of December 2019, with the possibility of staying on longer, and learning other tasks. You will have daytime working hours. You need to be available all day Tuesday and Friday, either Saturday or Sunday, and at least one other day.  There is some flexibility, but we ask that you keep the schedule once we decide on it.

We pay monthly. Benefits include unlimited free access to unsold farm produce and baked goods, and trading rights at market, giving you access to things we don't produce, like meat and cheese. We may have housing available at nominal cost.

You will also receive training in marketable skills, including but not limited to:

• making pastries and naturally-leavened bread on a commercial scale
• growing vegetables ecologically for market
• handling food safely
• processing fruits and vegetables
• successfully growing a small local food business

We look forward to meeting you!

Compensation

this position is: hourly, under $15/hr

Application instructions

Deadline

November 01, 2019