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WHO WE ARE
Happy Belly is a GLUTEN FREE and VEGAN bakery based in Hudson NY.
We are a REAL mom-and-pop shop. We have been in business for 13 years and we love serving our community with the highest quality food imaginable.
Monica is the baker and Brandon is the frontman 👋
We have brought together our cultural backgrounds and food traditions to create really unique baked goods with flavors and textures from all over the world— treats that you will not find anywhere else.
We call ourselves a wellness kitchen because these recipes were developed with health as the primary focus. Our baked goods are Celiac-safe. If you have any questions about our sourcing of ingredients and our processes please be in touch. We are happy to share who we work with to make sure it’s safe for your too.
The story of how it all started
from Monica: I started Happy Belly in 2012. At that point, I had been diagnosed with Celiac Disease for a number of years and was completely exhausted by the gluten free baked goods that were on the market. The ingredients were always lacking in nutrition, taste, and texture. The list of additives, modifiers, and heavily processed ingredients never sat right with me. I started experimenting with my own version of gluten free baking. I had a few years of culinary experience as a chef that helped me with the flavors, food combinations, and processes. I had an MFA that helped me with the concept, creativity, and overall aesthetic. I put those two together and created Happy Belly.
Happy Belly started with gluten free, vegan, and organic catering. I was hired by a local socially conscious business to cook and bake daily for their employees. It turned into the best incubator—I was able to test a lot of my techniques and recipes on the smaller scale before moving the business forward. I started at the Hudson Farmers Market in the winter of 2014. Around that time I also started developing a line of wholesale baked goods that I began offering customers. Eight years ago my husband transitioned into the business, bringing with him ten years of organic food industry experience and systems management.
about OUR ROLES
Brandon and I are a collaborative team that honors and highlights each other's talents and gifts. I am the woman behind the food and the concept. Brandon is the man making sure the ship is operating smoothly, the face at the farmers market, and the ultimate taste-tester!
Our mission is to enliven and encourage through food. We teach that food is a vehicle for self-love and self-care. We help our customers set down their apprehensions by creating treats that are made with conscious intention, nutrient dense ingredients, and full-filling flavors.
We have both lived the healing powder of food. Being together for 24 years and working through my' pre-Celiac diagnosis, we both saw how much food can either give life or drain life.
We want you to enjoy with wild abandon and let us do the rest!
about OUR BACKGROUNDS
Our cultural backgrounds lend to our mission, they are important in understanding our story: Brandon is Chinese, Scandinavian, and German— with his deepest roots in the Pacific. I am Sicilian, Celtic, and German— with my deepest roots in Iraq and Iran.
We bonded through food and found our identities through food.
We saw ourselves around the table, talking story, and experiencing where we came from every night with our families. This is a passed-down heritage that we share despite being from different backgrounds. We understood the core principle: food ALWAYS takes center stage and is woven into our DNA. We infuse this history into everything we create because it is simply WHO. WE. ARE.
We’ve been in the food industry since we were young. In addition to working in various restaurants in NJ and NY, Brandon worked for a decade at a local organic food producer before leaving to help grow with Happy Belly. I grew up in a fruit farming family, I worked GreenMarkets in NYC starting at 14 years old, I worked in a cooperative kitchen for a number of years (before my Celiac diagnosis), and then I did my MFA thesis work on local food justice issues. We have been part of the Hudson Farmers’ Market for over 14 years and we have been working as market managers for the last five. We are deeply rooted in our community and do everything we can to highlight the businesses we work with.