Oh jeez, where'd my holidays go?
Oh wait, waking up at 11 p.m. for work at midnight till noon! What a rush! I loved it!
As amazing as it was for my first holiday as the one of the main mixers at Zingerman's for the holidays, kinda glad I clock in at 2 a.m. now though! Unforunately, being a production area, cell phones are highly discouraged so snapping pictures isn't really a possibility. But I'll fill everyone in by saying, I mixed all through the holidays, baked some nice loaves, spent many many days in a blur of work, come home to sleep till my alarm went off at night, repeat. Laundry was neglected, so was shopping for food, and if I had a pet, I don't know what happened to it! (Did I have a pet?)
When Christmas day and Thanksgiving day came, all I did was sleep. Glorious! I don't know, but no matter how much sleep you get, waking up at 11 at night is still really hard, haha!
But I was making some amazing bread, and that's what matters. In fact, the day before Thanksgiving, I took part in making over 20,000 pieces for the day shift alone! Insane to think I was working with that much dough!
Now things have calmed down a bit and I am switching between being the main mixer, baking challah, french and starting on the rye ovens soon. We also have had Tino from the Dresdner Stollen backerei staying with us to teach a few classes this coming week at our school, and enjoy some American baking. This morning Tino and I were mixing together with Wurzelbrot, Dinkelbrot, Kartoffelbrot and one other spiced and delicious dough as well. Tino is pretty awesome to work with and in a matter of a few hours I learned quite a bit from him.
His bakery and a bit of profile can be seen here; Dresdner Stollen.
Whats in store for my baking in 2013? Well, I just received my third baking related tattoo yesterday with a partial-quote from Hamelman on it, so cross that off the list. Just gotta finish a bit more of my arm to have a sleeve of baking related tattoos! Oh, jeez, I'm marked. In it for life.
Perhaps travel to another bakery this summer for a week internship (maybe Dresdner?), I should be putting in a few hours a week doing pastries at Zingermans as well as bread baking, and also working the night shift as well as the day shift too. Essentially try and learn everything Zingermans has to offer me. All of these ideas have been conveyed to those that need to hear them, and actions are slowing being made to make it all work. Nice n' busy.
Oh, and make my Pain de Urban loaf even better with skills I've picked up from all the bakeries I've worked at now over the years. And to think, I turned 25 in December and still have a whole life-time of baking ahead me. Makes my heart flutter a bit.
Take care!
Arlo
If you're wondering, my other bread tats are a baguette that says fresh daily on the inside of my whole bicep, and then a play on the band 'Black Flag' with four chocolate eclairs lined up like their logo, and the words 'Baked Goods' aligned accordingly.
Classy right? Hahaha....
