ManresaBread, which is currently available at the Palo Alto and Campbell farmers’ markets and a weekly pop-up in Santa Cruz, announces a permanent bakery space and retail location at 276 N. Santa Cruz Avenue, opening December 2014, according to the Los Gatos Patch.

Inspired by the bread program at the two-Michelin star Manresa restaurant in Los Gatos, ManresaBread offers hand-crafted, small batch breads and pastries by Manresa head baker Avery Ruzicka.

Co-founded by Ruzicka, Partner and Manresa Chef/Owner David Kinch and Partner Andrew Burnham, the company will look to expand to other retail locations in the South Bay.

“Avery took the bread program at Manresa to the next level and being able to share that outside of the restaurant happened naturally for us,” says partner David Kinch. “We grew from one to two farmers’ markets to the Santa Cruz popup and a brick and mortar was the next step. We’re excited to start out with a smaller scale retail space in Los Gatos and see where we go from there.”

Similar to the culinary philosophy behind Manresa restaurant, ManresaBread focuses on time honored, hands-on techniques and high quality ingredients.

The 800-square-foot ManresaBread retail shop stocks a rotating selection of breads and sweet and savory pastries including Manresa levain, polenta sour dough, sesame flax sourdough, cinnamon raisin loaf, monkey bread, kuri squash streusel muffin, hazelnut brown butter cake, onion gruyere tart, pecan sticky bun, and more.

The seasonal and ever-changing menu highlights classic bread and pastry and also allows the team to introduce new products and creations that are distinctively their own.

Partner/Head Baker Avery Ruzicka brings a degree in culinary and the art of international bread baking from the French Culinary Institute as well as experience working with Master Baker Ben Hershberger of Per Se Restaurant and Bouchon Bakery to the ManresaBread team. Prior to the launch of ManresaBread, Ruzicka worked a number of kitchen positions at Manresa before taking over the entire bread program.

“I love the whole process of working with bread – cultivating the starter, tweaking a recipe, working with the dough, and using all of my senses to gauge if it’s time to bake,” says Ruzicka. “I took over the bread program at the restaurant and when the opportunity to start selling outside of Manresa came up, I jumped at the chance.”

Designed in partnership with San Francisco-based Robert van Horne, whose work includes Tosca Café, Belcampo Meat Co., and Delfina, ManresaBread is both classic and modern, taking influence from traditional bakeries and patisseries from around the globe but incorporating contrasting colors, industrial accents, and natural building materials including wood, marble, and copper. In addition to the building materials, outdoor elements are important to the design and guests can expect to see a lot of local plant life throughout the space including olive, ficus, and citrus trees.

The commissary kitchen, just down the road from the retail space, features over 3,000 square feet of space for production.

A 19,000 pound TMB Tag Gas Deck Oven from Italy allows ManresaBread to bake up more than 100 loaves of bread at a time. In addition to expanding the bread and pastry operations at the new space, the team is also planning to mill their own wheat.

In addition to the new retail space, ManresaBread continues to have a presence at the Palo Alto and Campbell farmers’ markets on Sundays as well as PopUp in Santa Cruz on Wednesdays.

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