Boudin Sourdough Gets Slice of New Disney Concession

San Francisco sourdough bread has joined wine on the menu at Disney’s California Adventure, the Golden State-themed park due to open in early 2001 beside Disneyland.

With a lump of the “mother dough” it has used since the Gold Rush, Boudin Sourdough Bakery and Cafe will set up operations at the Anaheim park. Hungry visitors to a “made in California” area will watch bread being baked as they queue up for sandwiches, soup in sourdough bowls and espresso.

Boudin is the second outside sponsor of a California Adventure attraction. The first was Robert Mondavi Winery, which will build a $10-million facility with wine-tasting rooms and restaurants--but unlike Boudin, no actual manufacturing. Disney hopes 7 million people a year will visit the park, “and we view this as a terrific way to tell our story,” Boudin marketing director Joe Dew said Wednesday.

The tale began with Isadore Boudin, a Frenchman with gold fever who wound up in San Francisco in 1849 too poor to buy picks, pans, ponies and tents. Falling back on other skills, he baked traditional French bread nontraditionally, using sourdough starter.

Boudin, purchased in 1993 by Specialty Food Corp. of Chicago, now operates 30 Bay Area restaurants, seven in Chicago, five in San Diego and one each in Irvine, Costa Mesa and Aliso Viejo. The official announcement of the deal had not been made, although Disney officials confirmed it. Dew said he didn’t have details of financial arrangements.

The workplace displays are a pet project of Disney Chairman Michael D. Eisner, who as a child was fascinated by tours of razor, glass and chocolate factories.

Eisner wanted a chocolate company in California Adventure--of course speculation centered on Ghirardelli--but none has been found. Barry Braverman, the head Disney “imagineer” in the park, said the company still hopes to find a candy maker to set up shop, along with a tortilla company and other enterprises native to California.