Emily Dinwiddie-Cole has been cooking and baking Scottish and English foods for 25 years and has just opened up a food cart, Dinwiddie’s Bakery, that sells Scottish shortbreads, English scones, ginger cookies and other treats at local farmers markets stretching from the Tryon International Equestrian Center to Columbus and Harmon Field in Tryon. (Photo by Michael O’Hearn)

In the words of Emily Dinwiddie-Cole, owner of Dinwiddie’s Bakery, her food cart is “a healthier alternative than fast food places” and there are foods here in America that are “too sweet, too much, too fatty, too processed and too everything.”

For more than 25 years, Dinwiddie-Cole has been serving up traditional and healthy foods in the authentic British style that deviates from the processed and sugary foods served here in the United States.

Five weeks ago, she said she had a lot of people including her husband tell her she should sell her treats and foods in a food truck. She began doing so, and now ventures to farmers markets from Columbus to the Tryon International Equestrian Center in Mill Spring.

“I started baking Scottish recipes about 25 years ago when I found out my ancestry is Scottish,” Dinwiddie-Cole said. “I enjoy baking and cooking and the passion just took over. I then realized that the U.K. has a millennia-long history of healthy foods.”

She said she found the recipes of the U.K. variety have less sugars and are not processed and that she loves looking for long lost recipes in honor of her husband, who is from England.

When she tried to set up a bakery and café out of her home in Connecticut, merchant laws in the state would not allow her to bake and sell her foods from home. The same is true here in North Carolina, she found out.

“I started just baking Scottish shortbread, brown bread and English cottage loaf and ended up just giving them away,” Dinwiddie-Cole said. “When my husband and I relocated here, I began talking with local residents and they said having a bakery would be great.”

Dinwiddie-Cole found a mentor through SCORE, an organization that helps small business owners start and operate their businesses, and Robert Williamson, economic development director in Polk County.

She said she was supposed to begin her business where the Farm House Restaurant used to be and where the Winding Creek Brewery now operates in Columbus, but said she could not find the funds necessary to rent and start the business there. After a series of unsuccessful interviews, her husband decided a food truck would be the best option.

“I got in contact with some local organizations in search for a commercial kitchen to borrow,” Dinwiddie-Cole explained. “I found one and exchange time in their kitchen for catering in their events’ desserts tables. I now bake and participate in the local farmers markets on Wednesdays at the Tryon Harmon Field market, Thursdays at the TIEC and Saturday at the Columbus market.”

She hopes to bring the British and Scottish diet styles here to the U.S. to illustrate the health crisis in America.

“The goal is to bring the healthy foods and recipes from the U.K. to the U.S. to try to help improve the health of those here in America, or at least in the Southeast to start,” Dinwiddie-Cole said. “The menu will include Scottish meat pies, Scotch eggs, Scotch kale and oats, Scotch broth and the delicious pastries I’ve already been making.”

Funding her business stands as one of the toughest challenges for her bakery, Dinwiddie-Cole said. Eventually, she wants to purchase a full-scale food truck to drive her business around. The funds she makes goes towards the purchase, licensing, registration, inspection and permitting of the truck.

People can order her food online at dinwiddiesbakery@gmail.com or by phone at 828-216-5870. Dinwiddie-Cole also has a GoFundMe page open for donations at gofundme.com/eadinwiddiesbakery.