Mill & Mortar was established on February 1, 2008. Behind Mill & Mortar stands Iben Büchert, who previously worked in the consulting industry, but has now adopted her hobby of interest in food as her means of living.
Iben has a long-standing experience as an entrepreneur at Quartz Strategy Consulting where she was one of the founders.
Iben Büchert
Touching on the inspiration for founding Mill & Mortar, Iben says:
“I’ve always been interested in both the creative and business aspects of food, and Mill & Mortar is a dream come true. When I started Mill & Mortar, I, of course, used the skills and experience I had from the consulting industry, but I also needed to get out of the world of suits and Powerpoint presentations and work with real products.”
Mill & Mortar is located in Vedbæk, Denmark – with a spice factory with storage, production and office facilities.
Currently, we have 12 employees who work diligently to deliver spices and almonds to wholesalers and distributors in over 22 countries.
Concept & philosphy
The purpose of Mill & Mortar in all its simplicity is to tell the many amazing stories about spices and to provide the inspiration and the ingredients to spice up your food. We select most of our spices according to a principle we call ‘Product of Origin’, which means we are looking for:
1. Spices that look, smell and taste like when they were harvested.
2. Spices with an origin. We know when and how they are grown and harvested. We like to ensure that the process is sustainable; that the resources of the soil are not depleted, and that humans, animals or other ecosystems remain unharmed.
3. Unique products that can tell a story about people who work hard to create something unique.
The quality of the spice is paramount – we want our consumers to be inspired to use raw, organic products that enrich their lifestyle while looking good on the kitchen shelf.
READ MORE ABOUT HOW WE WORK WITH QUALITY
Mill & Mortar distributes the best quality spices from all around the world. We offer organic, fair trade, traceable and single-estate products.
Suppliers – We know ours and stipulate the highest quality standards!
We work vigorously to build a healthy and trustworthy relationship with all our suppliers because we rely on the fact that they will always deliver the best quality. Conversely, it means that the individual supplier must be satisfied with the terms of trade and cooperation that we offer.
Our suppliers are skilled and passionate spice farmers, who usually value quality just as we do. Their farming is characterised by proud age-old traditions in spice cultivation. Of course, we also demand high standards from our partners, in terms of quality, processing, packaging and shipment of the products, and encourage spice farmers to cultivate and develop new varieties.
Quality – Our spices are hand harvested, hand-sorted and hand-packed
There is ample difference between hand-crafted work and machine labour. Our farmers predominantly tend to their soil and produce according to ancient traditions, which means that the spices are hand-harvested and hand-sorted. While this is more time-consuming than machine-processed products, it is also, in fact, a quality assurance of the goods in the cultivation field. In addition, we carry out thorough quality control of each product before it is put into stock in our factory in Denmark. To this effect, we have skilled packaging personnel who prepare our spice blends, weigh and pack spices by hand, etc. This kind of controlled system is inherent in our way of work.
Ecology – with flavour in focus
We mainly have organic products in our range, some even wild organic, especially because they taste better in most cases. Spices that are not driven by artificial remedies are permitted to mature naturally before harvesting and develop pure, raw aroma. In cases where you do not find organic products on our spice shelves, it is either because there is no organic variant or because the conventional spice is truly just a delicate product. An example of this is our smoked HOT pepper.
Mill & Mortar’s spices – for both professionals and those who just enjoy good food
All ‘foodies’ appreciate high-quality spices and many like to mix their spice mixtures themselves. At Mill & Mortar, we offer an extensive range of basic condiments with over 60 spices and salts – and there are new exciting variants added every year.
And while everybody loves to eat good food, not many can dedicate several hours to the kitchen. Food must be easy and quick to make, but also tasty and flavourful. And hence, we have a wealth of well-composed spice blends with a variety of different ingredients and recipes on ways to use – all you have to do is add salt as needed (our spice blends do not contain salt as we consider it an unethical practice).
Find inspiration and Bon appetite!