Hi everybody,

I own an artisanal bakery/wineshop/cafe in Winston-Salem, NC. We are looking for someone to help bake bread a few nights a week. If you know of anyone good, send him/her our way... My email is eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%77%73%62%61%6b%65%72%79%40%68%6f%74%6d%61%69%6c%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%77%73%62%61%6b%65%72%79%40%68%6f%74%6d%61%69%6c%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b')).

Hi All,

In other posts, I've made it clear that I consider internships to be a valuable part of our team building/hiring process, not to mention that it's a great way to "give back" to the industry. Lately, however our local schools have made some changes that seem to be somewhat bizarre and counter-productive.

It used to be that interns would be sent on two or three interships (as high as 6 for one school) starting about five months into the course. Now, they are being sent out after a few weeks. Good Lord, they're lost!!! One recent interns didn't know how to put a paddle on a mixer, another tried to combine 30 litres of bombe-method chocolate mousse in the mixer and succeeded in making chocolate soup.

The second new rule is that interns can not go back to a shop for subsequent internships. Ideally, they are asked to find internships at a pastry shop/bakery, a restaurant, and a hotel. Used to be that we would take an intern for the duration and put them through all facets of the business. Heck, the better ones used to do stints in formula creation, costing, supplier interaction, product selection/mix, etc.

Now, I don't expect interns to be experts, and I do expect my staff to teach them, but, give me a break. Am I wrong in expecting them to have, at least, a rudimentary base of knowledge before they are sent out? I spoke to the two largest schools and they told me they wanted students to have real world experience ASAP. Seems to me that they will scare off many potential sucessful people by tossing them to the wolves (so to speak)

Internships in our shop are fought over, and some of my people are guest lecturers in the schools, but I am seriously considering telling the culinary schools to take us off their lists for first internships. Doing so would stick in my craw. The schools need us to put the finish on their students.

What have been your experiences? What steps do you take in granting internships? How do you manage your relatioships with the culinary schools? If there are any culinary school people out there, or students for that matter,... What is the logic behind sending out these "lost souls" way before they are ready?

I usually sign of with "Cheers'" but not this time.

Greetings bakers, 

I'm opening a small bake shop, but I'm having trouble finding a few items in bulk at reasonable prices.

-Linen Lined Banneton:

         I found them online by Matfer Bourgeat, but they were $20-$30 each! That sounds crazy!? I was paying just $9  for each 1kg willow bannenton from Germany: http://brotformen.de/.  

         Must I order them from france? I found linen/cotten bannetons for about $5: http://www.meilleurduchef.com/cgi/mdc/l/fr/boutique/produits/dec-banneton_entoile_ovale_230.html Are there any other options? Should I just make my own?

Couche: I've also found couche in the US, but each peice seems to be $20, that also seems wild. Are there any places where I can buy a long peice and cut it myself? 

I guess I'm just looking for bulk suppliers for artisan bakeries. Do they exist? Thanks! 

I am a baker at a local restaurant. I do both the desserts and the breads, with much more experience in the pastry department than the breads. This has not caused any issue until this past week. The hoagies I am making are having issues. It recently got cold here  so the kitchen has gotten colder, as they do not put the heat on in the kitchen. Also, I just found out out that my manager recently dropped the temeperature of the walk-in. I store my hoagie dough in the walk-in, as I make a big batch twice a week and just pull out what I need each day. In this past week I have had lack luster hoagies, and twice where I had dough that got very sticky and refused to rise, at all. I looked at the walk-in temperature this morning and it was sitting at about 36 degrees farenheit, before people started moving in and out of it. Could this low temperature of the walk-in be causing my hoagie dough woahs? Or is there another culprit that I need to look into?

I hope I posted this in the right forum. If not, I apologize.

I have come to a point in my education where I will be graduating in May, and have a few months before continuing on to higher education here in the states. Between that down time, I am looking for a chance to expand my knowledge, and be privileged enough to learn from another baker about the craft which I love. I am not the type to settle into stagnation. Through TFL, school and work, I have grown as a baker and hope to only continue fulfilling my wetting appetite for understanding the steps of bread baking through another trained baker. I am hoping I may find someone or some help on TFL in my search for an internship.

I now have over two years of baking experience in high volume and small independent bakery production (40 hour+ weeks), and ACF certification in pastries, culinary certificate, minor degree in hospitality management. I understand there are many more bakers out there than I. Many wanting internships at places just like myself as well. I also know I will, and should start at the bottom at your business. Lifting flour, sweeping flours and watching from the sidelines until I have deemed myself worthy. I am perfectly fine with that. I have no sense of entitlement when I step into your bakery. I only wish to learn.

I'd be willing to send all my references, resume, cover letter, photocopies of important documents to you as we work something out. If an oversea possibility arises (which I'd love), I will gladly work on a 90 day visitor visa and fulfill all needed paperwork to make it happen. Yes, one of my teachers is currently looking for an oversea internship for me, but I figured it would never hurt to do some searching for myself as well. Currently, I am looking to start in July-August of 2012, staying until October-November. If we can work something out, I'd gladly stay a bit longer, without a doubt.

The catch is though, I'd need a place to stay. I could offer some payment and would be willing to discuss terms and condition if needed.

If you have any information, please message me on here, or leave a note in this post. Anything would be appreciated, and I thank you in advance.

Hello everyone!

I'm so glad to have found this forum to post my questions. After reading several posts, I know I can get the help I need. 

I am about to embark on my first real business opportunity to bake pies for a new restaurant that opened in my neighborhood. To do so legally, I'll need to rent a kitchen. I want to start slow first by renting by the hour then monthly. The rate is $25 per hour and $600 per month for 15 hours per week. I learned through the other posts, to price wholesale at my cost times 3. Then I saw a post that said to factor in labor and fixed cost like rent so, do I divide the hourly rental fee on top of my wholesale cost? If so, I might have a pricier product than I want and will have to really adjust. Should I just do what it takes to break even and then raise prices later when I know I'll need to move to monthly rental?

Thank you!

Does anyone have any experience retarding shaped loaves in a temperature-controlled fridge? I have a theory that an second-hand fridge, maintained at 10-12C, will allow me to retard 36 loaves. I've been considering deep plastic pizza dough boxes to hold the brotforms, but I'm concerned that these may not allow sufficiently rapid cooling of the dough. Does anyone have any experience? Educated guesses? Better suggestions?

I'm moving up from a few years of regular home bread baking to very small production (to sell to friends, etc.). I've always preferred the taste and crumb of dough retarded during secondary fermentation (and the schedule control it allows). My best results have been acheived by using an old freezer, hooked up to an eBay temperature controller set to 10-12C for an overnight fermentation (directly after shaping), with the brotforms sealed in ziplocs to prevent excessive drying. My loaves are generally whole grain or 50:50 whole grain:white, scaled to 750g.

I'm considering buying 6 stackable deep pizza dough boxes, which should hold 6 brotforms each, more or less filling a standard fridge. I'm assuming the fridge will be better than the old freezer as there is much more airflow in a fridge. I'm concerned, however, that the dough boxes, which are designed to seal to one another, will insulate the dough too much and prevent sufficient cooling. Pizza dough boxes have the additional benefit for me that they can be used to transport shaped loaves, as I need to move dough to a rented oven until I can build my own WFO (this would be much more difficult if the brotforms were stacked on sheet pans or boards, which I have also considered).

Obviously, in the long term, some sort of retarder that can accept racks would be ideal, but I don't want to spend too much capital on that right now. If someone has a brilliant idea to build a retarder on the cheap in my basement, I'd love to hear about it.

What is generally considered an acceptable % of batch weight that doesn't make it into loaves? With preferments, levains, soakers, etc there is always some left behind. I imagine that there is a small bit of evaporation in play, too. Am I just a sloppy amateur? I try and calculate the batch total at about 2% over the loaf title. If the batch is eight 700g loaves, i usually shoot for 5.8kg total on paper to have enough dough for the loaves with maybe 25g left. Does this sound about right?

I don't think I've seen this addressed in the books I've read, but maybe it's in AB&P (I don't have a copy, yet.).

Hi Guys,

I am the only baker for a cafe, and in the last few months we've begun making our own ciabatta for sandwiches. 

 So far, i've been mixing an 80% hydration dough. I mesure out the water then mix in the leaven and then add the flour into a big bowl. It weighs about 2olbs all together.

We don't have a mixer and I've been finding that mixing the dough by hand is creating a lot of lumps of flour that i'm having trouble getting rid of. I end up having to cut out the bigger lumps when I shape the bread into sandwich squares. 

Does anyone have any advice or strategies for making large batches by hand?

Ideally i'd like to mix a 40lb batch all at once (instead of doing two 20lb batches), but i'm having a bit of trouble handling that much dough in a small kitchen.

Any other ideas about increasing efficiency in any part of the breadmaking process would be appreciated as well.

Thanks a ton!

Came across an interesting item on a "sourdough" loaf label in the local supermarket.

They bake those tasteless loaves on site with addition of "sourdough flour". They taste midly sour, but nothing like well fermented sourdough. When I enquired what "sourdough flour" is they said it's just like any other bread mix in a 25 kg bag  - mix with water and bake as per instructions. No additional yeast required. The process is the same as for all their other yested breads.

Did anyone come across it?