We recently connected with Melissa Green and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Melissa thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

I am proud to say that I am completely self taught! Back when I was living in Canada, My aunt went to a bread making class with some friends and told me how much fun she had. It turned out that the teacher of the class was also a client at the veterinary clinic I worked at, so I started talking to her about it and I was going to get a group of friends together to take her class. Life happens and that didn’t pan out, but I kept thinking about bread making. I eventually decided that I was going to just try to do it myself, so I researched it online and took the plunge. No surprise, it was a lot of trial and error at first. If I’d taken that class it definitely would have sped up the learning process, but the way I did it, I just had to keep making attempts, noting what worked (and what didn’t) and I went from there. I had a tiny kitchen in the apartment I lived in, so that definitely didn’t help things, I was only able to do a small amount at a time, but I made it work. I think what helped the most was that I already enjoyed cooking and I had a pretty good handle on following recipes and knowing what flavors go together, I also don’t have a lot of fear of the kitchen, so I didn’t have much trepidation about teaching myself a whole new skill. I’m a perfectionist and when I decide I want to do something, I’m not going to give up until it’s as close to perfect as I can get it. Not always the best attitude to have, but in this situation it definitely worked in my favor.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Melissa Green and I am the owner/operatedr/baker/manager/etc etc etc of Maple and Bluebonnet, a home-based cottage bakery. I specialize in small batch artisan rustic style breads and other baking such as banana bread, pizza dough, focaccia, cookies, buns, and I’ve recently started making pita bread. Everything is hand made by myself and baked in my home oven. I got my start back in 2015-16, when I was living in Canada. It started out as a hobby that I would do whenever my full time job would allow, but I quickly discovered a passion for it and my friends and family were always telling me how good it was and that I should start selling it. That didn’t really happen until I moved to Texas in December of 2019. I moved here because this is where my then fiancé (now husband) lives. When Covid hit a few months later and no one had anything to do, I continued baking and honing the skills I had already developed. My husband created a website and social media pages for me, and I started doing some self promotion. I did a few farmers markets in 2020, and more in 2021. This year I have done some markets as well as being a vendor through the Rockwall Farmers Co-Op, which I encourage everyone to check out their website! Www.rockwallfarmerscoop.com The markets are a great way to meet people and I really enjoy doing them! I have gotten a lot of repeat customers who make purchases from me at the markets and then continue to purchase through my website. I think people like the products I put out because it’s something different, it’s always fresh (sometimes even still warm from the oven), there’s no preservatives and minimal ingredients, and it’s made personally for them personally with care and love. I pride myself in only selling things that I would eat myself and I hope that anyone who orders or purchases from me can see (and taste) the attention to detail I put into everything that I make.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Without a doubt, it’s having complete creative control over everything. If I don’t like something, I get to change it without asking anyones opinion or having to go through a chain of command to get approval. If I have an idea I’m excited about, I can run with it and try it out at that moment, and I don’t need to worry about what anyone thinks, or getting permission. There is a lot of trial and error and testing things out, but that’s one of my favorite parts of what I do. I am always thinking about recipes and coming up with crazy ideas to try. I love looking at restaurants menus, browsing the grocery store, and spending hours looking at recipes and food blogs online because I never know when inspiration is going to hit me. Just ask my husband, when I get into the “zone”, I get so excited about my new ideas it takes everything I have not to drop everything and try them out then and there.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I got my start back in 2016 and it was truly a small hobby at that point. I decided it would be fun to learn, and other than the few websites I found which I got my beginners knowledge from, I didn’t search out much more than that. Once I got my base recipe down, I started playing around with adding different kinds of flour and ingredients, seeing what worked. To be honest, at that time, it didn’t cross my mind to seek out other bread makers and make connections. I now realize that there is a large community of people out there, and the majority of them are so passionate that the will gladly share their knowledge, especially with someone like me who was just starting out and knew almost nothing. I am a part of this community now, and I share whatever I can to help out. If I had realized this at the time I was starting, I know I could have learned more. I’m happy and content with where I’m at now, but am also constantly learning and gathering knowledge from as many places as I can. For anyone starting out in any form, I would encourage you to seek out that community. There are people out there who are always willing to help. You just need to find them!

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.mapleandbluebonnet.com
• Instagram: Instagram.com/mapleandbluebonnet
• Facebook: Facebook.com/mapleandbluebonnet

Image Credits
Brandon Green (Lone Star Local)