Hungry Ghost is my favorite bakery. I would go as far as to say that they're one of the premier bakeries in the United States. I've known people who have moved to Northampton because of this bread. Pretty much every time I'm in town I stop by to pick up a loaf of bread, a cookie, or a tart, or often a few to take home to share with friends and family. They also do pizza in the evenings nowadays. They cook in a giant wood-fired brick oven. It's the kind of place that many people dream of getting a job. Some of their employees are even hip enough to participate in Bolad's Kitchen. My only critique is that they don't use 100% local organic grain. They source locally for some of their food, but not others. read more

True sour sourdough! As a transplant from the SF Bay Area the sourdough at Hungry Ghost makes me feel like I'm back home. I have yet to try a bread I don't love from the ghost. Always delicious and their pizza is fantastic! With sourdough crust and local toppings it's my favorite pizza in town! read more

The rosemary bread is to die for, service was lovely, the guys are super knowledgeable and the rhubarb gallette!!! Omg!!! Such a quaint spot, I sat in the medicinal garden/ amphitheater and had a bite of my warm bread. Amazing mouth feel! And the gallette was wrapped in the best pie crust! read more

Wonderful bread and service. Their other baked goods are also delicious. During this pandemic, they have built a small lean-to over a window so that no one has to go in. You pay online after purchasing! Very community minded. read more

I love love love Hungry Ghost ! I have the unfortunate pleasure of living close by, and am often pulled into the shop by the scent of rosemary bread read more

If you're looking for bread, this is the place. My favorites are the 8-grain and the hat trick. Also, the chipotle chocolate chip cookies are so good (I had no idea they are vegan when I first bought one so for vegan cookies they are phenomenal). read more

Best pizza in the area, I don't even have a favorite type because they are all so equal in flavor combination. I can say that this place does vege pizza way better than other places. read more

We got the Tosca cake over Christmas. It was fabulous we couldn't get enough of it. Please make this cake every day. It has just the right amount of sweetness and I loved the slice almonds and caramel on top of it. Yum! read more

Disclaimer: I only tried the items available in the display case and did not take home a pizza or loaf of bread, so this review is based on that experience. Fun spot set back from the road in bustling Northampton. Walking in is a feast for the eyes, and there is lots of great looking loafs on display in every direction. I just wanted something on the run on a Sunday, however, so I got an egg-biscut - a huge biscuit with an egg cooked into the middle of it, and some cheese - and a couple of different kinds of cookies. Unfortunately, the results were a bit underwhelming. Everything might have been amazing had it been fresher, but it tasted at least a day old, rigid and chewy in bad ways. An offense to biscuits and cookies. I'll have to go back for the bread or pizza and see how that goes. read more

Came here twice in one weekend! Stopped by on Friday evening for pizza, it was so damn good. We got a vegan pie with basil and olive oil and ate the whole thing sitting outside the shop. Came back this morning for bread and a cookie. I truly love everything about this place and can't wait to come back. read more

The apex of bread in America. Sourdough which evolves with the New England seasons fermenting locally grown and freshly milled grains in the European tradition, baked in a hardwood-fired masonry stove. Where the morning loaf is a different breed than the afternoon, and the tarts rule the night. In a region of excellent bakeries and grains sparkling with flavour, this one brings all of us back to yore. read more

I don't know what the fuss is about here. We went a few times and were unimpressed with the bread. The crust was overcooked and hard, and there were so many air pockets it didn't have much substance. Furthermore, the service staff was irritated to have to serve newbies. My fairly basic and understandable question of "what would you recommend?" got an eyeroll and exasperated wave at the breads. Dude, this is western mass, not NYC; relax the attitude. read more

Hideous pizza. Here's an excerpted review from my website: To some Northamptonites, this review will strike the wrong chord. They will place it in the same shock category as a "Nobama" bumper sticker. The Hungry Ghost, a two-time James Beard semifinalist, is a small town staple atop a small hill in the center of town, flanked by office buildings and groceries just off the main drag. When I first came here for school, it was all everyone spoke about. "Oh, you must try the Ghost- they only bake one kind of specialty bread a day and don't bake any more when they run out! The owner wrote a ballad about the bakery! They have a schedule for their bread." Handwritten menus and a shabby workspace pass for status indicators in this area, I noticed. In fact, I entered the bakery twice prior to their late 2011 renovation and left before ordering as I was appalled with the putrid state of conditions there. Formerly a dusty, dank bakery, albeit one with lovely smells, the reviews of The Hungry Ghost's bread range from passionate to pallid. But it was their recent renovation and switch to pizza that piqued my curiosity one evening, prompted by an October 2011 review by Serious Eats writer Liz Bomze, when the bakery had first branched out to pizza. Informed that the pizza would take twenty minutes to cook, a strangely long time in a brand new Llopis wood-fire oven, we were told to come back. We perused a local deli and returned only to be informed that the bakery was cash-only. No signage alerted us to this fact, nor did our server choose to capitalize on our twenty minute wait by offering up this fact. Thus, our pizza was delayed another ten minutes as we found an ATM per her vague directions and went on our way. That ten minutes made no difference at all. In fact, I doubt ten seconds would have made a difference, because this pizza was abhorrent both hot and cold. For starters, the composition. A margherita pizza is retardedly simple: tomatoes, mozzarella, basil, and a little extra virgin olive oil. Our pizza had rivulets of grease pocking its surface and running down the sides and into the crust and was sparse in the basil department. Apparently there's a shortage of skimpy, free-range basil leaves in the region. Fresh tomatoes were replaced with what tasted like canned tomato sauce, and the cheese was barely browned. I'm not sure if the owners got an upcycled oven or if it was left on the curb and posted on freecycle, but it yielded a flaccid, soggy crust with a gummy interior, each piece collapsing on itself, saturated and glistening with more oil than a male model and shedding dandruffy flakes of cornmeal and flour when moved from box to plate. The first few bites of each slice were wet, thick, and slimy, the result of the copious amounts oil migrating to the center of the pie. $13 bought an extremely bland, oversweetened twelve inch pizza that left a sheen on our lips and carried a pervasively annoying sourdough tang. I've had heartburn with more flavor. Our server was insipid and rude and ruined our day by ignoring us while she spoke to a friend. We had structured our day around getting this pizza tonight. I'm just pleased that we didn't go "full pizza" and snag more than one pie or even upgrade to a larger size. This was so unappetizing that we didn't even bother to sit down at the table with it, much less open the bottle of Mondavi we'd left chilling for the occasion. From the many Bret Easton Ellis novels and old issues of the New Yorker I've perused, I gather that high-end restaurants of the 80's were proud of being stingy and standoffish, cultivating the type of clientele who would know better than to question the difference between ceviche and cilantro. I don't, however, understand why this snobby "value" is superimposed onto the more mediocre examples of fine dining I've seen in small towns. It seems like a certain strain of naive people equate this attitude with quality dining, and it unfortunately causes restaurants like this to thrive where they can be king of the college pizza scene. Hungry Ghost comes across as a ludicrously arrogant big fish in a small pond. The hype is not deserved. Ultimate suckage. read more

A truly incredible bakery (matched only by Wild Flour in Freestone, CA). Jonathan and his wife (whose name I have forgotten) run a truly unique operation: housed in a tiny historical building, Hungry Ghost is a one-room bread store occupied almost entirely by a huge, gorgeous, $20,000 imported french brick oven. They make wonderful sourdoughs, raisin breads, spelt loaves, fougasses (bread with cheese baked in), and one day I was there, they had sticky almond chocolate brownie bars. Yummmmmmmm...... read more

Bread is very good, but I wouldn't call it great. Cookies are good but generally unremarkable. So the products are pretty good, but it's the service where this place falls flat. Every time I have gone in I get a rude, angry-at-the-world hipster waiting on me. Fine, I get it: you're too good to be living in the Hamp; you shouldn't have to wait on people to make a living; but for the grace of God you'd be livin' in NYC with your very own entourage; etc. I right there with you an all of that, now just drop the attitude and sell me a damn loaf of bread. read more

3 for excellent bread. -2 for lazy rude customer service. They do great work by the ovens but front of house is a disaster and not very business savvy. I'd say not even energetic enough to be rude. Disengaged sad people who run out of stuff a lot, and don't seem to care. The shoulder shrug personified. It's a shame that such incredibly good bread is just not as tasty when served up by a sulky pseudo-hipster. Basic rule...when someone hands you money for something, it's a serious business no matter where. The second you put up a sign looking to sell, then the customer deserves some basic respect. That said if you want to blow off some steam and get some good bread, it's a 5-star experience :) read more

The poor customer service at "The Ghost" overshadows the artisanal breads and other baked goodies. Upon entering, you're usually greeted with a blank, disaffected glare, as though you had horns on your head. Most around town (and here on yelp) would say you have to look past that, and just take the bread with the bad. But with Woodstar around the corner, and their far superior service, it's just not worth going to Hungry Ghost. Suggested alternative names for Hungry Ghost: "Don't Need your Business Ghost" "Indifferent Ghost" "Too cool for School Ghost" "Ambivalent Ghost" read more

It's not clear why this bakery has the reputation it enjoys. Bread is far too salty. Do they even measure it or do they just dump it in??

This is by far the best bakery in town. A lot of things about Hungry Ghost make it kind of difficult to patronize, but the trouble you go to to get something there makes it taste even better. First of all, there's very little space to stand and nowhere to sit inside or outside (except for a concrete ledge which works fine). Second of all, there is a ten dollar credit card limit. Want to try the pizza? Call ahead between 5 and 8:30, cash only, carry out only. But you will forget about all of this when you bite into one of their bakery items. Try the scones and egg in a biscuit for breakfast, and definitely try the pizzas for dinner! read more

Mostly fab -- but what's going on with the challah? No egg, no oil, no honey. It's basically white bread wearing a braid. Not bad, but not real challah. And this in a town with a solid population who knows the difference. No wonder there were so many challahs left, even late on a Friday..... read more

Amazing artisan bread and they now serve pizza (including vegan options) that rules too!

Great bread! I bought the everything pretzel and immediately sat outside to eat it. It was still fresh and warm from the oven and had a great combinations of textures from the crunchy exterior and the chewy interior. Really good. read more

oh no THAT YOUNG PERSON HAD VAGUELY ODD HAIR AND DIDN'T SMILE AND MAKE SMALL TALK WITH ME they must be one of those hipsters i've heard so much about as someone who was buying an onion pizza for one on a friday night, i give five stars to both the quick and silent service and the predictably excellent crust man i don't trust take-out places that have overly friendly workers anyway; what are they hiding behind those fake twisted grins? go to this place if you want to exchange your money for some wonderful bread if you want a friendly face and a chat call up one of your friends, maybe they'll bake you something read more

As an ex- pat San Franciscan doing penance in the "happy valley" I think I can speak to sour dough- this place is the shiz, down to the earnest, taciturn stinky hippy monks who serve the yeast gods, laboring ceaselessly before the roaring bread kiln. You will be happy to pay the artisanal prices. Go. read more

i love this place, but .. i don't know what to say. every time someone walks in it is like you are causing a major hassle for the people behind the counter. yah they have great bread, but it's like they arent happy to be here or appreciate that you are paying a lot for their fine baked goods. but really, this is one of my favorite bread bakers on the east coast. read more

Hungry Ghost Bread - Bakeries Near Me - Northampton, Massachusetts

Best bakery I've ever encountered. I really appreciate people who take pride in their craft. The brick oven show commitment. I can even forgive the blatant and shameless hippiedom! read more

Fresh hot bread! Many varieties and it's so popular they do run out fast. A nice throwback to older times. They serve pizza too, although I haven't tried it. The hill gets slippery in winter so watch out. The smell and heat from the huge wood fired ovens adds great ambience while you order your bread. read more

I bought 2 loves of the bread both were over cooked very tough crust and dry inside. This is the 2nd time I've gotten over cooked (burnt) breads Time too look else where read more

Freakin' great!! This bakery is one of the best kept secrets in 'Hamp that really makes their product from scratch (scratch not meaning a fifty pound sack of bread mix but REAL ingredients) It's a no frills place, so don't go there looking for a ritzy bistro or café. Just a word to the wise-get while the getting is good. They only make so much product and when it's gone, it's gone. The hours are somewhat limited, but the product they bake is soooooo worth it!!! read more

Go across the street to serios and get some good butter. Then run back to Hungry Ghost and buy a loaf of something holy and eat with abandon. Only then will you understand the "yes"banner fluttering outside. read more

You can't go wrong with Hungry Ghost bread. Their pizzas are also amazing, and they make the best pecan bars! All are cooked in their awesome central oven. read more

Friendly service.... No. Great bread.... Yes. And if you leave without a delicious large cookie, you'll regret it.

Simply the best bread around and worth traveling for....great crust, texture and taste no matter which bread you order. Fabulous!!

Slightly off the beaten path in downtown Northampton, this is a tiny eclectic bakery primarily known for their roughly 8 different breads, including spelt, rye, eight grain, sour dough and others. A small number of other offerings, including some delicious cookies, rounds out the bakery appellation. When we visited, they were in the midst of their first season of growing spelt and barley on the roof. Hard to imagine they'll get much flour out of such a small plot, but to each his own. We bought a loaf of the eight grain, which was hearty and delicious, along with some wonderfully decadent cookies. The place has that angelic fresh bread bakery aroma that makes one want to linger. read more

A truly world class bakery in the the Pioneer Valley. Another reviewer's comparison to Wild Flour in Sebastapol, CA is an apt one. While this is not a Parisian Boulangerie, they are really excellent at what they do, wholesome brick oven breads with well developed flavors and simple ingredients. I try to stop in for bread pretty much every time I am in Northampton. read more

Everything they put out is seriously amazing except i'm not a fan of their cookies as it is too chewy and sweet for my liking. I have friends who love the Cowboy Cookie so the cookies are just preference thing. Otherwise, the breads are amazing and you can't really go wrong. However, they serve other items which i feel are slightly underrated but to me, make Hungry Ghost really special. I love love sourdough so for me Hungry Ghost is a haven since they primarily use sourdough flour (i believe). Because of that, you must get the CROISSANTS on Saturday mornings: best in Northampton and that i've ever tried. It stays amazingly crisp even after a few hours but it only happened once since i can never resist myself: You'll smell the fragrance of butter through a crisp crust protecting flaky buttery layers inside. The textures, smell and flavor makes this croissant extremely savory and i just love it plain! I've had croissants that were too airy, brittle and dry but this one achieves the perfect harmony with enough substance and bulk of the flaky layers to balance out the buttery goodness. Now that i've moved away from Northampton, I can't seem to find a bakery that makes decent biscotti. They change up their flavors from time to time but their classic and my all time favorite is the ALMOND BISCOTTI. Occasionally they will serve pistachio and chocolate biscotti which is also to die for. Their biscotti is distinct because it has this grainy texture (really unnoticeable) and a certain fragrant smell that i can't distinguish. I'm telling you, it is something in the dough that makes it so so tasty. When you get the chance, snag some savory pies, pizza, cornbread, and CHOCOLATE BABKA'S! Sometimes I'll also stock up on their vanilla granola. I love how natural it tastes as it isn't too sweet. I've been coming to this place regularly for 4 years and in terms of service, it really depends on who is on shift. So far my experience has been pleasant except for some few occasions. Missing this place dearly. T_T read more

I think this bakery is as great as any I've eaten in Europe! . So worth the visit just for the Cookies, never mind the bread - yum. Love the vibes the old chamber building brings to the area. A best bet is the Levain read more

I stopped in here yesterday with my mother, she visits often when she is in the area. We purchased an egg in a biscuit and a loaf of bread. I do not remember what the bread was called but it was delicious. There was so much dimension in the flavor of all the grains they added and i love bread thats soft inside and a bit crusty outside. Worth a visit. read more

Hungry Ghost bread has ruined me for life; they literally make the best bread I've ever had. Never again can I accept an uncrisp crust or a gluey crumb. Inferior breads just make me sigh and reflect on their loaves with longing. Their batarde is really perfection as far as I'm concerned, especially when it's still warm from their gigantic brick oven. If they could ship it to New York in said state, I would sign up for a weekly subscription in a heartbeat. read more

Very hipster, meh service but hella good food! Got vegan pizza and cookies and wow. I was blown away! Good prices too