“At Libre, we are passionate about freedom. Our bread and teas feed a liberation practice that nourishes you through and through.”
— MARIA JUDICE, FOUNDER, LIBRE ANCIENT GRAINS AND HERBS
Libre creates gluten-free bread and herbal teas that taste and feel good to the body, mind, and soul.
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Maria Judice eliminated gluten from her diet 5+ years ago. She grew up in San Francisco, a bread mecca, and longed for that morning toast, butter, and jam. She found it difficult to buy a gluten-free sandwich loaf that tasted good and spread butter without crumbling into many little pieces. After years of research (yum!), she made gluten-free bread herself! She drew from the baking queen from herself, her Grandma Liz. She knew her ancestors made bread out of more than wheat, and she could do it, too. Over the last few years, she’s been perfecting the Libre Loaf. She now has many options to put between two slices of bread.
Alternatively, a severe car accident changed her diet and limited her consumption of another favorite love – coffee. How does one live in San Francisco without coffee or bread? She was a fanatic but realized that maintaining the morning drink ritual helped her replace coffee with homemade herbal tea mixes. Again, invoking the ancestors, childhood memories informed her recipe. She often sat with her Creole/Cajun grandparents in their Ingleside greenhouse, drinking chicory coffee. A dash of cinnamon always made it something special. After many years of herbal studies and plant-based cooking, she found a great aromatic, flavorful, and bright recipe her sister, Reyce, named Xoffee. Her morning ritual returned with toast, butter, jam, and a flavorful, energizing roasted drink.
Ancestor knowledge leads her pathway. Knowledge of roots, herbs, diet, movement, and interconnectedness with the land has been passed down and is critical to her living healthily. Currently, she’s studying to be a tea sommelier to further her love of herbal remedies, drinks, and medicine.
Libre is a prayer, an affirmation, a meditation, an invocation that, in all things, I will be free to make choices that benefit my health and well-being.
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Libre is a combination of good things from Mother Earth that are healthy to eat and taste good.