Simon Matthee, owner and baker at Millett Road Maker, started running a micro-bakery on his 10-acre property in the Macedon Ranges eight years ago with his wife Sarah. Millett Road Maker originally focused on local wholesale bread loaves and English muffins before Simon played around with making crumpets from his sourdough discard five years ago. Now, those crumpets are Simon’s main business and the inspiration for the many delicious collaborations at farmers markets around Victoria.
Simon has a simple philosophy: good people make good food. His genuine desire to build community and support other small producers is baked into the story of his crumpets, english muffins and bread loaves. Simon loves collaborating because it creates a connection to other producers and those relationships make better food.
His first collaboration was formed at Woodend Farmers Market where he met Sarah and Daniel from Dreaming Goat Dairy. Simon’s popular whey bread loaf mixes Dreaming Goat Dairy’s leftover whey with local Victorian flour to create a super soft and silky bread in a crisp crust. He is also partly to thank for the delicious English muffin on Back Alley Bake’s menu, a pre-COVID era recipe collaboration between Simon and Back Alley Bake’s Gabriel Alonso.
Sourdough Crumpets & Farmers Markets
Farmers Markets are where Simon’s sourdough crumpet journey began. From Woodend, expanding to Lancefield, Coburg and Carlton, selling at farmers markets has allowed Simon to connect directly with customers, gain confidence in the business and get direct feedback from his customers, which helps him to understand what he’s doing right. “Unlike the wholesale business, I get direct feedback from customers at farmers markets so I actually know that people want this product and people want us to keep going.”
Simon is deliberate about using local, high quality ingredients in his simple crumpet recipe because the flavours of the base ingredients are clear and discernible in every bite. Simon explains that there’s very little between the ingredients and the finished product, so you really taste the flavours of each ingredient. “If you've got a rosella wheat crumpet, you are tasting that rosella wheat, that is the hero of it. And it’s the same with a whole grain wheat crumpet or a spelt crumpet, it's just all about that basic ingredient.”
Simon figured out pretty quickly that the real benefit of a crumpet is the ability to showcase the ingredients. And after that, the development of collaborations came thick and fast. Simon began attending more farmers markets and building relationships with farmers and local producers, which has allowed Simon to offer a really special product.
Millett Road Maker’s toasted crumpet collabs include a baked apple crumpet with salted caramel from Trois Bon on top, and a dark ale crumpet with shitake mushroom butter, drizzled with crisp chilli oil from DC Cartel. His newest collab (currently only at Woodend Farmers Market) is a dark ale crumpet with Wolftown brisket burnt ends and melted Long Paddock cheese, topped with Ultra Culture’s coffee pickled beetroot leftovers. (Simon’s toasted crumpets are available, ready to eat, at Carlton and Coburg.)
Simon regularly sells out of his staple take-home packs which offer sifted rosella wheat crumpets, whole grain spitfire wheat crumpets, or wholegrain spelt crumpets. Other crowd favourites include the dark chocolate crumpet and the dark ale crumpet, which are available from time to time. Simon is an advocate of using “seconds” or leftovers of quality ingredients from other local producers, including dark chocolate from Monsieur Truffe and dark ale from Rock & Ranges Brewing Co-Operative.
A No-Growth Business Model
When Simon and Sarah began Millett Road Maker they agreed to follow a no-growth-model, focusing their efforts on earning a living by improving their stoneground small-batch sourdough and the food in their community. Since crumpets took off, Simon has stopped selling wholesale loaves of bread but still bakes some for customers at a few of the markets he attends.
Simon employs a small team of three people who all work part-time to support Millett Road Maker and Simon drives an electric van that has just enough juice to make it around his wholesale delivery route. He’d love to sell wholesale crumpets into more cafes, and is focused on expanding into cafes in his current wholesale route.
Grab a Zine with your Saturday Crumpets
Aside from his delicious crumpets, Simon also creates paper zines which talk about his crumpets and collaborations (if you see one at his stall, check it out!). Simon’s passion for farmers markets and his genuine motivation for community building has made him a crowd favourite, and his delicious crumpets keep us coming back for more.
Check out MillettRoad Maker’s Instagram, and website.
Market Dates: Carlton Farmers Market every third Saturday; Coburg Farmers Market every third Saturday.