It all started with mum's cooking...
From the beginning
The story of Moin is a story of good food, and it all began with a small vegetable garden and the devotion of a mother who loved cooking. A longing for the good food of his childhood has been the driving force behind the life-long work of company founder Hans-Paul Mattke.
His guiding principle "Love thy neighbour as thyself" has been adopted into the company culture here at Moin where making good food for other people is our mission. For this, we gladly provide all of our skills - and we can only do this if we take good care of ourselves.
Hans-Paul Mattke started his career in the eighties as a journeyman baker and confectioner and as a co-founder of a leftist collective in Wiesbaden. With bread baking campaigns he called attention to the doubtful quality of industrially produced foods. The result of his dedication was his first bakery where he devoted himself to learning about natural fermentation of bread. This type of fermentation is very different from sour dough because it means recreating the right environment for the bread every single day. The credo is: presence instead of tradition. Mattke learned that his mental condition strongly influenced the quality of the processes and, for better or for worse, the results.
After selling his share of the bakery "Kaiser", which still exists today in Mainz-Kastel, he decided to study art at the University Ottersberg. He applied to the university with a loaf of bread. After his studies in 1994 he returned to baking with even more enthusiasm. "I did not want to become a poverty-stricken artist", he says.
This time, however, Mattke did not want to face the unnatural rhythm of a baker’s life which starts long before the cock crows. At the same time he knew about the difficulty many bakers have in creating the right environment in which good croissant doughs can mature. The connection of both thoughts led him to the idea of Moin Bio, a production facility of frozen baked goods. The result was the first frozen organic whole-wheat butter croissant. "Good food is not just the sum of raw materials and procedures but something that is created by the attitude of the person making it. I am thinking of how we cook for our loved ones at home. It is this attention and love that we also want to nourish and cultivate in the professional production processes."
After an initial phase in Bremen, Hans-Paul Mattke decided to relocate and in 1997 chose Glückstadt as the home for Moin. The first staff came from Russia, Belarus and the Ukraine. They have brought not only a great drive and a lot of warmth into the company but also their love of food; qualities that have shaped our firm to this day.
The initial idea was to relieve bakeries from work by providing them with pre-produced frozen organic baked goods. Since 2001 we have been developing more and more baked goods which land directly in the shopping carts of consumers in organic supermarkets. Our selection is being adapted and expanded piece by piece. More doughs and varieties of croissants are being added, and we added baked products because we had missed the warmth of the baking ovens during production. We are being directed by the wishes of our customers and by what we ourselves would like to eat. This is how we create our baked goods. Everyone at Moin participates in this process and can give his or her opinion since we are all experts when it comes to food.
We insist on being absolutely consistent when it comes to only adding natural ingredients to our food so that it's good for people. Food supports and enhances our development as human beings.
This only works with the best ingredients. We need excellent knowledge of the raw materials as well as intuition and the experience to handle the changing conditions of live raw materials like flour or butter. We do not use technical enzymes which facilitate many baking processes in conventional bakeries. We refrain from using technical enzymes not only because of the questionable effects they have on humans but also because we would lose our know-how to the enzyme producers. Aside from Hans-Paul Mattke, his wife Brigitta Sui Dschen Mattke joined him as a managing director of the company in 2014. The performance artist, ethnologist and graphic designer got to know - and love - Hans-Paul Mattke during a symposium about the artist Joseph Beuys in 2004. The native Franconian followed Mattke to Glückstadt where she, together with her husband, is bringing the company into the present. Besides marketing and communication, she also examines the way that space for reflection and consciousness can be created within the daily work routine. The Mattkes interpret this undertaking as an artistic project benefiting the personal development of all those involved. And the story continues...