On the invisibility of bakers

revel in the glamour

I made a joke not to long ago about how bakers are invisible until they try and take a day off.  This was my barely clever attempt to comment at my own shortsightedness while providing national commentary about how most people feel about bread. Like many barely clever things I didn't think about it until after I said it, and then I couldn't stop thinking about it - at least the second half.

Bakers tend to get lumped together with pastry chefs, and when compared with delicate sugar showpieces and towering wedding cakes, beautiful bread seems, well, like a whole lot of brown.  Nancy Silverton, who with her ex-husband Mark Peel,  helped pave the way for a revitalization of small bakeries in the US, was honored with a James Beard award for best Pastry Chef in 1990. Pastry chef.  I don't know how well she can quenelle sorbet, pull a perfect sugar curl, compose a plated dessert that follows the vision of the savory side.  I do know she can make amazing sourdoughs, killer pizza, and yes, pastries that sell in her bakery. She is a Baker! Huzzah! Her cookbooks have received James Beard awards for Baking, because unlike the chef categories, baking gets its own place in print. Why do we acknowledge the books in a distinct category but not the craftsmen who created them?

I think it's something like this: The stories say your Foremothers made bread at home.  Therefore it is 1. women's work and 2. best acknowledged in a home setting, like a cookbook.  The problem is the initial faulty hypothesis - all the baking happens by women at home.  That wasn't true in Egypt, or Rome, where men ran the bakeries.  In feudal France it was illegal to even have a personal oven - minimizing the risk of fire while reinforcing the power of the feudal lord. The baking guilds in history often specified male members only (although family was usually exempted in the name of all hands on deck). Hell, even now you are more likely to find men baking your bread, because of that whole crazy hours and ladies have babies thing.  Yes, there is the pioneer/farm/idyllic media image wife at home baking for the family - but there are still bakeries in town.  Were the people baking for the community somehow less valuable?  Or maybe you just didn't see them, because they were having dinner when you had breakfast, and in bed when you were up and about on your day.

Then there is the bread itself.  A basic, a staple.  It's the thing everyone is supposed to have (even though not everyone does) and because everyone is supposed to have it, no one should have to pay very much for it.  A talented chef makes national news when he explains why rice shouldn't be free at Asian restaurants. Yet, the American public still expects free bread at restaurants. Guess what? That hunk o' baguette you didn't eat actually required as much if not more labor than the free rice.  Ever have a good sandwich on bad bread? Was it still a good sandwich, or did you think "This would have been a good sandwich if..."?  Ever have a soup that was made just that much better because of the crackers, croutons, or hunk of bread on the side? We see these elements as garnishes, an afterthought, not a foundation you don't pay attention to until it cracks.

The truth is, we don't do much scratch baking at home. It takes time most people don't have. I find more and more that my building blocks like bread flour are available in only small quantities at the store, replaced by instant mixes and ever more freezer space for microwaveable ready to eat items.  So why don't we begin to celebrate the people who take the time to make beautiful breads where we can't?  I know this will seem like blasphemy here in the US, but how about being willing to pay more for bread that is actually worth buying?

How about simply learning the names of a few bakers? Not the shops, the people. That shouldn't be too difficult, right?

Deliberately avoiding authenticity

It's five days before Fat Tuesday and the Paczki police are after me already.

Really, after more than a few months in the bagel business I should be used to this.  The internet has made this sort of commentary inevitable.  I should be jaded, steadfast, above this sort of thing.  I should just accept that I am wrong.  Acceptance is the first step in the healing process, right?

I am wrong.  There, I admit it.  My bagels, while New York style, are not the exact ones that Mr Expert #4 had on May 15th, 1982 at H&H. Nor are they the ones that Ms Professional Opinion #26 lyrically remembers from her childhood ramblings in which she accidentally while chasing a ball happened upon a 3rd generation bagel making family's one tiny storefront.  They aren't even the ones that you could get from any other bagel place right now.  They are too small, too large, too malty, not malty enough, not topped enough, topped too much, too different and sometimes not different enough. I did not grow up Jewish in New York City. Also, the water is different.  Despite all this, they are good bagels.

Paczki are a Polish pre-Lent celebration, a way to use up all your naughty ingredients, a damn tasty variation of the doughnut.  Thanks to immigration patterns, I discovered them in Chicago.  They are rich, with a supple dough, filled with custard or fruit, and I have missed them.  They just aren't found much in the neighborhoods of Portland, and each year I have seen other transplants seek them out, and end up disappointed. Really, what's the point of having a bakery if you can't fill a pastry void? So I asked. I made samples. And then a few more samples. They were well received. Now, for one single day we will celebrate one more puzzle piece of where we came from.

We post pictures, tell a story, and get the word out.  Then, it begins.  Those are too round, not round enough, not big enough, too big, probably don't have lard, aren't glazed, shouldn't be glazed, should be fruit filled, should never have chocolate.  Not the Real Thing. Also, they have never been eaten by any of these people.  It's even possible that they never will be eaten by some of them.

It's ok.  You are all correct.  I am not making something you may consider authentic. What I am making is a recipe passed on to me through who knows how many hands and minds.  I have adapted it to my own purposes.  And yes, I am daring to call these Paczki in full knowledge of this fact.  But my Paczki is made with a sincerity of purpose. It is true and genuine to what I know Paczki can be.  It also tastes really, really good.

What does authentic mean again?

Why do you need a pastry chef?

Because if you are a place that specializes in other people's occasions, having someone who can write "Happy Anniversary" legibly and correctly spelled on a plate is a good thing.

Because maybe someday you will want to make a galette, or put something on puff pastry, and you won't have to buy the dough.

Because a pastry chef can contribute to the savory side of things more than most savory cooks can contribute to pastry.

Because it isn't hard to figure out if your desserts are bought frozen and then served up, even if you garnish the plate.

Because it would be nice to have something on your dessert menu besides creme brulee, molten chocolate cake, key lime pie and cheesecake. Oh and a scoop of ice cream, ask your server for "today's" flavors.

Because that VIP will really like having a custom dessert whipped up just for them.

Because even though its the labor costs that make having a pastry chef expensive, a good pastry chef is going to work to make the expense worth the money.

Because long after your appetite for savory fails, your appetite for sweet carries on.

trying to perfect the imperfectable

I have a new obsession. Growing up on the East coast, doughnuts were either dunkin, or, in my world, Schneider's. I've gone through phases with cake and jelly. I distinctly remember my first beignets. I've moved around a bit, experienced hot doughnuts now, locally made doughnuts of good varieties and generally, I'm a fan. Hell, I even had them on the dessert menu at one of the places I worked. We called them Dishwasher Crack and had to take them off the menu because, strangely, sales did not match the number that were going missing each night...

To sum up, working in pastry has totally ruined doughnuts for me.

I can't imagine just grabbing a doughnut every morning. I mean, sure I could eat a doughnut regularly, but now, when I succumb to the urge, all I can think is "Crap. Mine are better." I can taste the bad fry oil (and worse, recognize it), notice the flavorless batter, scoff at poor quality toppings. Sure, there are good doughnuts out there, but, you see what I'm saying.

Now, I could make them at home. I just hate deep frying at home, for all the reasons anyone would hate deep frying at home. So I've embarked on a quest. I'm trying to make perfect baked doughnuts. Not "not too bad" as I saw one recipe described. Not a muffin. Not in a doughnut pan either because on some base level that seems like cheating. I'm trying yeast and chemical leaveners. I'm playing with flours, and I have a couple of weird ideas that may or may not work. And any real doughnut fan will tell me it is just not possible, because hello, frying! Totally different cooking medium! I'm trying anyway.

The ones in the picture are from batch three. They were ok. How many batches will I make before they come together, I wonder.

Stories

There are regular periods of downtime that you can expect, plan for. Between meal rushes. January. Those are times for rejuvenation, restoration. They help restore the psyche for what can be a grueling job even as they offer a little too much time for practical jokes.

I'm not so good with practical jokes.

What I like, though, are the unexpected downtimes - minor, surmountable disasters. Like the tree that knocked out power for the last three hours of the shop's day. After the flurry of getting everything as taken care of as we could, we started to wait it out. You have to wait it out, at least within reason, because those freezers need to come back on when the power is restored. Those timers need resetting, and if you can, you still need to get those doughs made. But until then, what else can you do but sit around, (possibly with the sudden manifestation of beer) and tell war stories. And don't think it is not a competition for the best fish.

We got some doozies. Boston blizzard deliveries with customers screaming about why they shouldn't pay because they weren't able to open even though you got the bread there on time. Side of the road wedding cake repair after a fender bender. The hands-down winner was the almost no power for three days after a windstorm the week after Thanksgiving. As in, driving proofed bread to another bakery to bake off just so you wouldn't lose it, and getting the power back only after you'd wiped out all the holiday backstock inventory you'd been prepping for weeks. Ouch.

Power was still out when I left, back on as usual the next morning.

The Epic Battle between Man and Machine

A new home kitchen is a living beast. Relationships are often established quickly, and can only be reshaped through constant, repeated effort. You do your best to set up familiar territory, to make sure your arsenal is ready when the unexpected strikes, but the fact remains the place is different. Outlets on different walls. Cabinets in different configurations. Worse still, in the case of the rental, different appliances.

A pizza box does not fit in my new oven, but thankfully, the half sheet pans do. There are only two outlets in the whole kitchen, and in order to plug in the mixer, I have to unplug and move the toaster oven. It has tiny, narrow cabinets and a single sink rather than the double I used to have.

There is a window, looking out into our patio and the hill with the hazelnut tree and the murder of crows that our landlord feeds. An open set of shelves gives me easy access to pantry items, and the general setup feels airy even though I know with absolute certainty the space is small.

I've made lovely cookies so far. That torte and a cherry clafoutis. Some terrific, farmer's market inspired dinners. Chili cheeseburgers. Udon. Eggs. Chocolate Marionberry jam.

I think we'll be ok together.

Thousands of chefs can't be wrong, right?

My sister has ideas that often have merit. Case in point, the brown butter panna cotta was her suggestion, and while I still think it will make a killer flan and I need to tweak the actual process for this just slightly, the original idea was worth investigating. Many of her ideas of late have been focused around manager roles in a creative workplace in a digital/modern/changing world. I've been thinking about her ideas and if they would work in a kitchen. They are very mentor-driven ideas, full of facilitation and communication. How credit and praise get assigned. Less regimentation, more fluidity.

I'm not sure how many of them could work, and I'm not sure how much of that is me having bought into "the way things are done" in most professional kitchens.

Here it is, in plain English. I don't like the way my boss does things. I think some of his work is good, more of his work is outdated and the rest is at best half-assed. His style of mentoring doesn't teach us much of anything because most of the time his answers are the "because that's how its done" type. More than once I've asked about why something works the way it does and gotten an "I don't know". And then there are those other issues so common in an industry like this one. I'm not delving into those. But as I'm being screamed at for some trivial detail about how to plastic wrap a sheet pan that was perfectly legitimate yesterday there is a little part of me that says, "Ah, yes, this must be a real kitchen, he must be a good chef, because that's what they do." I sat in a meeting once in which we were told to suck up the abuse because one day we would be in charge and would abuse people because that is how things get done. Lots of kitchens follow this axiom.

I'm not sure it really has to be that way. Does it? What parts of the system do we keep, what parts to get rid of?

Escoffier is credited with the brigade system in most kitchens, specialized roles that define who does what where and when. And now there are kitchens where every cook learns every place, where they rotate out to the front of house and act as servers, even. But, as a specialized cook who would have a really hard time boning out a chicken, I kinda like that brigade. There is a tradition of cooking less and less as you move further up the scale, and I really don't like that one. I'd rather stay low, for now, and get my fingernails dirty. As for the screaming, the psychological damage, well, this industry is a pressure cooker and something has to weed out the bad veg. So what replaces that so that when you really need it, when it is your 23rd day in a row and tomorrow you feed a four course plated dinner to 600, you turn around and you have a staff there ready to go?

How do you get the passionate ones? And if you get them, is this how you keep them? Where is the line between practical, inspirational necessity and just stupid egotistical habit? I'm not sure what the answer is to that. I am scared of what such an answer would say about me and where I am right now. See, I've stayed with someone who may be on the wrong side of that line. Probably when I shouldn't have. Has that ruined me for the good kitchens? Will I even be able to recognize them or am I going to look for the wrong signs?

Rather than spend my weekend thinking about it, I'll just cook.

Territorial marking among guest chefs.

Here's a thing I wasn't aware of until I became industry entrenched - there's a status thing among chefs. Not within an individual workplace, that is a hierarchy of which I was aware. I mean between the kind of work you do: caterers vs. hotel vs restaurant and that kind of nonsense. Each can have its own kind of disdain for the other among a certain caliber of chef. For some, your numbers mean everything - if you can't do a party for 1000 in one night without breaking a sweat, what good are you? Others will scoff, and say 1000 is right dandy a number but what does that say about your food? And a blessed few ignore both sides and just do the work. I like those kinds.

I don't know if it is guest chef season right now or what. I do know that we've had our menus prepared for us by someone who has never ventured near our kitchens numerous times in the last week. It's kind of fascinating. The way it works for the events we do is fairly straightforward. Our Executive gets the menu from the guest chef. That statement makes it seem simple, but it's kind of like that string tied to a doorknob method of tooth extraction, from what I've seen. We order the products, sometimes with perplexity, we do the prep. The guest chef may or may not appear with direction and tweaking. We put the thing together, go to the event. Once again, possibly we get direction on plating, last minute changes and the like from the guest chef now that we are on site. We cook the food, we plate the food, we serve the food, and then the guest chef takes a bow. Success!

Now this is not true for every event or every guest chef. I've seen both ends of the spectrum - chefs who were so grateful and sincere in their work that they were a joy to have in the space. We made room for those chefs, gave up the line, shared secrets. The ones that only came in to criticize our work, scoff at our prep team as "mere" caterers and basically gum up the works? Well, of course they saw us at our worst - it was all they expected to see.

If I ever have the opportunity to be a guest chef somewhere I hope I can remember this time and be the good kind of guest chef. I hope I will have a recipe that works as well for 800 as it does for 4; even better if I have the math done for 800 already. I hope I will communicate early and often with my needs and then stop making changes unless I have to well before the event takes place. I hope I consider the season when my menu is being served. And mostly, I hope I remember to thank everyone who helps me.

And if I don't remember those things, then I will not have become the chef I hope to be.