The Red Truck Bakery - Fauquier County, Virginia

artisans & entrepreneurs
artisanal Baking
Trista Scheuerlein
Photos by Dwight McNeill
Brian Noyes brings his experience as an art director
to the kneading board.
It started as a little friendly bake-off competition between
Brian Noyes, then a publication director living in California,
and his uncle in Florida. But it stirred up a passion for
baking that would lead Noyes to pursue formal training and a
second career in fine pastries and baked goods.
This is how it worked: Noyes and his uncle would send
homemade baked goods to one another, including the recipes
with each shipment. When Noyes would open his package from
his uncle, not only would he find cookies and the corresponding
recipe, but he would also rediscover the recipe he had sent his
uncle before, now covered in red ink with his uncle’s recommendations
for improvements. Years later, when Noyes moved
to Florida to be the art director of Tampa Magazine, he and his
uncle developed a recipe for honey whole-wheat bread that is
now a customer favorite at Noyes’s new enterprise, Red Truck
Bakery. “It drove my aunt crazy,” he recalls. “She had to clean
up all the messes we made in the kitchen.”
Art and Food Intertwined
Brian Noyes launched Red Truck Bakery as he shifted gears
from being an art director for publications such as Smithsonian
Magazine, Preservation, and House & Garden to being a farm
owner and baker in Orlean, Virginia. “I think every art director
wants to design something for himself,” Noyes says. “This
business is my chance to do that.” Noyes has been working out
of his farmhouse kitchen and selling via mail order and at select
area stores for two and a half years, but the new storefront in
Old Town Warrenton will allow him to increase production,
variety, and availability of his artisanal products.
The red truck logo is Noyes’s own design, inspired by his love
for red antique farm trucks. When he and his buddy Dwight
McNeill purchased a small farm in Fauquier County, Noyes
began looking for the perfect truck online. He found a great
deal on consignment in New York. Not until Noyes showed
genuine interest in the truck did he discover who its owner was:
fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger. After Noyes purchased the
truck, he received a personal note from Hilfiger with anecdotes
about the truck.
The bakery’s signature red truck, which Noyes uses for local
deliveries and events, will be parked outside the bakery on
Waterloo Street in Old Town Warrenton, wonderfully symbolizing
the bakery’s origin on Noyes’s Orlean farm, his close
ties to local agriculture, and the building’s original manifestation—an
Esso filling station circa 1921. “Half the fun is in the
packaging and marketing,” he says, noting the confluence of his
present career and his experience as an art director.
The other half of the fun, of course, is in the baking. Noyes’s
artisanal breads and pastries are enough to make even the
“I want to know who grew the
peaches, have him come in,
give him a piece of pie.”
—Brian Noyes
As seen in Flavor Magazine, aug./sept. 2009 • flavormags.com
As seen in Flavor Magazine, aug./sept. 2009 • flavormags.com

strictest carb counters swoon. Noyes trained at the prestigious Culinary Institute
of America twice, specializing in pastries and in café, artisan, hearth, and specialty
breads. He also trained at L’Academie de Cuisine near Washington, D.C.
Artisanal Defined
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When asked what distinguishes an artisanal bread, Noyes explains that his breads
are hand-crafted in a European style. “It takes time to get the flavor,” he says,
explaining why he will not use any accelerants or conditioners—chemicals which
speed up the rising process and create smooth and uniform textures—in his breads.
“Good bubbling yeast breads ferment for days. You can watch the bread dough live
and move. When you put it in the oven, that life becomes the streaks and holes—
that’s where all the flavor hides.” He also pledges not to use any pre-packaged fruit
fillings in any of his products, opting instead for seasonal and local goods. “We live
in the middle of some fertile farmland here. I want to take advantage of that,” Noyes
explains. “I make a pretty darn good cherry pie, using what’s fresh at farmers markets
or from my own trees. When it’s gone, it’s gone.”
In addition to offering customers’ year-round favorites—foccacia, harvest wheat
bread, and rum cake—Red Truck Bakery sells sandwiches and soups influenced by
the local bounty. A large common table is situated in what was formerly the garage
area of the service station. Here customers can meet for coffee, pastries, and lunch
fare. Noyes also carries other local artisanal products including honey, Virginia
Red Truck Bakery Persimmon Cookies
The arrival of these homemade cookies, sent by my grandmother each fall and winter,
is one of the highlights of my childhood. I haven’t found any kid who doesn’t like
them—they have a good but subtle hint of holiday spices and are chock-full of raisins
and walnuts. S For best results use local persimmons, which are usually available at
farmers markets (or from your neighbor’s tree, if you ask nicely) in autumn. Persimmons
are very acidic until beyond ripe, so store them in a brown paper bag until
extremely soft and squishy. The pulp is then easy to remove: Just cut off the top and
squeeze into a bowl, scraping the insides of the fruit with a spoon. The pulp freezes
well and can be used as needed; just bring to room temperature. One persimmon
yields approximately ½ cup fruit.
—Brian Noyes
Makes 20–24 cookies.
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup persimmon pulp (see note) ½ cup unsalted butter, room
2 cups all-purpose flour
temperature
½ teaspoon ground cloves
1 cup sugar
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 egg, room temperature
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup raisins
1 cup chopped walnuts
Preheat oven to 350 F.
Dissolve baking soda in persimmon pulp and set aside.
Sift flour, spices, and salt together. Set aside.
Cream together butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in egg and persimmon mixture.
Stir in dry ingredients. Stir in nuts and raisins.
Drop heaping tablespoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. Bake for 15 minutes.
Chutney made in Rappahannock, hot pepper jelly from near
Newport News, cheeses from Everona Dairy in Rapidan, and
Virginia peanuts. “I am open to having more local foods available,”
says Noyes. “I want to know who grew the peaches, have
him come in, give him a piece of pie.”
Striving for Sustainability
Using local foods is perhaps the first but certainly not the only
green aspect of Red Truck Bakery. Noyes has gone the extra
mile to try to make environmentally sound choices in all aspects
of the business. He and his new five-person staff will provide
biodegradable forks and knives, recycled and recyclable coffee
cups, and unbleached bags and napkins. The bakery will not
use plastic bags or non-recyclable clamshell-style packaging, and
it will offer discounts for reusing thermoses. “It’s been a little
bit of work to search out alternatives to plastic, and my distributor
looked at me like I was crazy when I asked for unbleached
napkins, but they’re out there,” Noyes says. He is even opting
for renewable energy in his Warrenton store through Dominion
Power. “I want to be as green as possible, as local as possible,
and as friendly as possible,” Noyes vows. Now that’s a good
recipe for a rising business.
Trista Scheuerlein is program director of the Headwaters’ Farm-to-Table
Program at Rappahannock County Public Schools. She has worked
on several small-scale farms and with agriculture-related NGOs from
Virginia to Oregon and Chile. She earned her bachelor’s degree in
English with minors in biology and sustainable development from
Appalachian State University.
Red Truck Bakery & Market
22 Waterloo Street at Courthouse Square,
Old Town Warrenton
(previously the home of Mom’s Apple Pie Co.)
(540) 347-2224
www.redtruckbakery.com
If you are not near Warrenton, you can order Red Truck baked
goods online or find them at more than 15 stores and wineries
throughout the region. A list is at the Red Truck website.
As seen in Flavor Magazine, aug./sept. 2009 • flavormags.com
As seen in Flavor Magazine, aug./sept. 2009 • flavormags.com