Producer’s Corner: Matthew Mallia, Hobz Bakery

There is an artisan bakery boom happing in Edinburgh. These days it’s not uncommon to see queues out the doors of many bakeries made popular through social media. 

But for Maltese baker Matthew Mallia, who owns Hobz, becoming viral has never been the aim. 

Named after the Maltese word for bread, Hobz specialises in baking naturally fermented bread (more commonly known as sourdough). 

Despite being recognised among the best in the world, Matthew said he has his heart firmly set on being a neighbourhood spot with an open plan layout and regular customers.

And he isn’t interested in chasing trends or the latest fads.

‘I wanted Hobz to show people the realness of a bakery setting by making everything on site. Everything is done in plain view of our customers,’ Matthew says.

‘At heart, we’re a small neighbourhood bakery, and don’t aspire to be anything more.

‘Sure, we have plans for the future, but we’ve managed to build a strong community of regulars, some who visit us multiple times a day.

‘We don’t chase trends or build up false hype. We bake what we want to bake, and don’t do anything with the aim of being viral.’

Matthew has loved baking since he was a child and has fond memories of being in the kitchen with his mum.

‘I have a vague memory of making these cupcakes with my mum when I must have been about four or five years old,’ he says.

‘They were a pre-mix made specifically for children and came with some sort of edible paper with cartoons on them. So not exactly skilful baking, but baking nonetheless. 

‘My mum will be the first to admit she’s not the best baker, but she liked to involve me whenever she had to make a cake.

‘I’m not ashamed to say that my favourite cake is still a Betty Crocker Chocolate Fudge Cake, with a Nutella based icing and smarties on top. 

‘Thankfully my mum was always supportive of my baking adventures, and never minded the mess I would make.

‘For a while I was considering opening a cake shop. I didn’t have any set idea of what I wanted it to be, but I do remember thinking that would be quite nice.

‘As I got older I remember getting more interested in helping my dad make pizza in his wood fired oven, and I enjoyed making the occasional batch of cookies or a pie for family gathering.’ 

Baking took a back seat during Matthew’s teenage years when he thought he wanted to be an academic. But he was drawn back to it in 2020 when he began to fall out of love with academia.

He taught himself how to bake bread and decided to embark on a 12 week diploma in patisserie at the now defunct Edinburgh School of Food and Wine.

After swapping his PhD at the University of Edinburgh for baking, Matthew began selling his loaves online. He would wait in the Meadows for hours, sometimes in freezing snow, for everyone who had ordered to pick up their bread. 

‘I was making more bread than I could eat, so I decided to have a weekly bake sale and sell my loaves online to locals who would pick up their order on Saturdays,’ Matthew said.

‘After a while I wanted to explore other opportunities, so I started setting up at markets.

‘I’d spend a whole day prepping, go to sleep for two or three hours, wake up at 1am and start baking all the bread and pastries before packing them up, getting in a taxi and going to the market. 

‘I’d set up, sell everything, come back home, clean up and crash for about 15 hours. 

Back then he had no idea what the bakery would become, it was just a way to relieve stress and earn some extra cash. 

But in 2021 he decided to open a bricks and mortar store on Leith walk and is now serving 1,000 customers a week – often seeing the same faces multiple times a day.

And does he take inspiration from his homeland of Malta in his bread making?

‘Sesame is big in Maltese baking, and we use it often. We’ve made cannoli, which though not strictly speaking Maltese are still quite common and are something I grew up eating,’ he says.

‘While small batch artisan baking has had a resurgence in the UK, it’s almost impossible to make a living from real bread making in Malta.

‘As far as I know no sustainable producer of completely naturally leavened Maltese bread exists.

‘Regardless, we do draw a lot of inspiration from Malta in our baking.’

Read more Producer’s Corner here.

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