A View from the Bean Store: Joe

When I first came to meet Josiah at the brand new Halesworth warehouse he was on his hands and knees laying the office carpet tiles. By the time I started work he and William had built the desks out of plywood and two-by-three! This reflects the spirit of working at Hodmedod - the business is built on creativity and hard work and has evolved organically with a certain amount of trial and error and some interesting experiments along the way!

We have now grown into a team of 16 across the warehouse, packing rooms and office. It’s a lovely team to work with - they're an incredibly hard working and dedicated bunch and have done a fantastic job of pulling us through all the challenges and stress that the pandemic has thrown at us.

My primary motivation for working for Hodmedod is the goals, values and ethics we are working to achieve through the business. But a very close secondary is the people we work with: the innovative farmers like the Gawthroups, John Turner, Mark Lea and the Fairs (to name just a few); inspirational businesses that use our products like the River Cottage team, Heckfield Place and Front Room Bakery (just down the road from us in Bungay); and the fantastic shops selling our products like Goring Grocer, Single Step and Unicorn Grocery, not to mention the fantastic surge of zero waste stores clearing us out of bulk products. All of these businesses are doing really great things and its brilliant to be a part of their story and to hear about what they are up to.

I enjoy cooking with all our products. I am a keen baker and make sourdough with Hodmedod flours every week, but I also love to cook pulses and grains. The lentils are fantastic with autumn squash, dill and capers and I like to make samosa with the whole yellow peas, potato and spinach – but I'm yet to try and make a samosa pastry with pulse flour!

I am excited for what the future holds with Hodmedod, I am hopeful that we are playing a part in a wider movement towards more regenerative agriculture, enabling people to eat more sustainable plant-based food, and overall giving them some delicious things to eat!

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