The brand new Mediterra Café has landed in Sewickley!
After a several months of anticipation, the first brick-and-mortar for Pittsburgh-based Mediterra Bakehouse has officially opened on Beaver Street in Sewickley.
The artisan bakery is known for their beautiful breads and unique pastries, found at locations all over town. With the opening of their first cafe, Mediterra is expanding in a completely new direction. The space will be a combination bakery, café, and lifestyle market.
At the Mediterra Café, guests will be able to purchase the Mediterra breads and pastries they know and love, as well as freshly prepared meals and specialty items.
Prior to starting Mediterra, founder Nick Ambeliotis worked as a food and cheese importer throughout the 1980s and 90s. Ambeliotis is re-establishing many of these connections, and the space will be destination market for specialty cheeses, meats, olive oils, syrups, chocolates, jams, and other items.
The cafe menu is now online, and offers a wide selection of salads, sandwiches, toasts, and meat/cheese boards. Dishes include the “Grilled Eggplant Sandwich,” with farm greens, roasted peppers, goat cheese and a herb vinaigrette on on sprouted spelt bread, and the “Breakfast Sammie” with a fried egg, aged cheddar, sicilian pesto, arugula, and optional porchette and av0cado on a brioche bun.
In the evening hours, the space will also offer a menu of conserva, featuring some of the imported items from the Mediterra market, such as sardines. Patrons will also be able to order dishes like grilled octopus and calamares.
Jacqueline Wardle, the chef of Josephine’s Toast, one of the original Smallman Galley restaurants, is assisting Mediterra Cafe with the development of their menu.
Addtionally, guests can browse the market for housewarming gifts, and pick up meat and cheese platters for parties and events.
Since its founding in 2001, the Mediterra has made dent in the city’s bread scene by committing itself to quality, and refusing to cut corners or take shortcuts in their baking.
Although they started as a small, in the 16 years since they opened, their baked goods have spread throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania and Ohio. They company also has a sizable presence in Arizona, where they own 35 acres and grow red fife wheat (used in their red fife levain and red fife ciabatta breads).
All of Mediterra’s breads are made in the French tradition, using slow rising dough, no yeast, cold water, and baked in French hearth ovens. Often times their ovens are baking 200-300 loaves, and it is the bakers responsibility to making sure each one comes out perfectly. Many of their breads take 16-30 hours to produce.
Mediterra credits their slow rising technique for giving their bread its signature flavor and aroma.
“The thing that makes our breads special is we don’t cut any corners,” says Mediterra head baker, Nicholas Ambeliotis. “There are no shortcuts taken, just hard work and knowledge.”
Mediterra Café will be open daily from 7:00 a.m.to 7:00 p.m.
More information can be found online.
Mediterra Cafe (430 Beaver Street)
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