Introducing

Leaven & Love Organic Bakehouse

If you have ever taken a bite of gluten-free bread and felt let down, Leaven & Love is here to change your mind. This small family bakehouse in Central Oregon bakes organic, gluten-free sourdough bread and bagels that are wild-fermented, gum-free, and built from freshly milled whole grains rather than a bag of flour blend and a handful of stabilizers. Every loaf starts with a live brown rice sourdough starter that has been maintained for years and gets a full overnight fermentation to develop real flavor and an open, tender crumb, the kind of thing most gluten-free bread skips entirely.

What makes Leaven & Love different is that they refused to accept "good for gluten-free" as good enough. Every loaf is certified organic, vegan, and free from all nine major allergens, and the entire lineup is low FODMAP, thanks to the same slow fermentation that builds the flavor. Whether you are managing celiac disease, a gluten intolerance, or you simply want bread made from ingredients you can pronounce, Leaven & Love bakes bread that tastes like it was made to be eaten, not just tolerated. Order online and it ships fresh, or catch them in person every Wednesday at the Bend Farmers Market.

The Rest of the Story

Leaven & Love Organic Bakehouse

Born Out of Necessity

Leaven & Love started the way most real things do: out of necessity. Founder Jeff Stratman's family needed bread that actually worked. Their youngest could not have dairy. His wife Ashley could not tolerate gluten. Their oldest needed to eliminate it entirely. What they found on store shelves was not food, it was a workaround: dry, dense loaves held together with gums and stabilizers, designed to pass as bread without committing to being any good.

A friend of theirs was baking gluten-free sourdough and selling it at a Central Oregon farmers market. The Stratmans bought her recipes and her customer list, rebuilt the formula from the ground up, and started baking. In early 2023 they made it official.

A Formula With No Shortcuts

What they make is simple: wild-fermented sourdough, gum-free, built on freshly milled whole grains and certified organic ingredients, given the time it needs. No shortcuts, no additives, nothing in the loaf that does not belong there. Where their recipes call for sweetness, they use organic coconut sugar, maple syrup, or unrefined organic cane sugar, never refined white sugar. Every Classic loaf is completely vegan and free from all nine major allergens, which in the gluten-free space is rarer than it should be. The bread is also low FODMAP, since the extended wild fermentation process breaks down the fermentable carbohydrates that trouble many people with IBS and digestive sensitivities.

A Small Family Bakehouse

Leaven & Love is a small family bakehouse operating out of a licensed commercial kitchen in Oregon. That is not a technicality. It means the bread is made the right way, at real scale, without sacrificing the formula that made it worth eating in the first place. You can find their bread every Wednesday at the downtown Bend Farmers Market, at The Stand in Sisters, Oregon, and by the slice at Terra Kitchen in Redmond, Oregon, or order it shipped nationwide.

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