for the love of bread

This afternoon I am to babysit Snowdrop and two of her friends over at the grandgirl's home. My first thought is this: what after school snack should I bring over for the girls to share? Grandmas thoughts always do run to food...

Fruits. Yes, mango because they are tasting so good these days! And strawberries. Also lovely right now. Special stuff. The kids have plenty of apples in their lunchboxes. What else? Let me go to the bakery and pick something out!

If ever there was a flimsy excuse to make a morning run to Madison Sourdough...

The thing is, I love poking into a bakery early in the morning. The smell, the packed shelves of breads and these days --croissants, pains au chocolat, cinnamon rolls. The line of people waiting, with their vision of maybe a morning treat with a milky coffee, or a good bread for lunch. 

I have loved bakeries since I was a kid. You'll know of course that postwar Poland experienced food shortages in the years I was a child there (if you don't know, you could read about it in my book, Like a Swallow!). But bread was ubiquitous and both bread bakeries and pastry shops never seemed to have the shortages that grocers and meat stores experienced. Warm breads and of cakes from the pastry shop around the corner. Mmmm! And this love of shopping for baked goods has stayed with me. When I'm in a new city, one of the first things I take note of is its bakeries. In Paris, I'll never pass a pastry shop without staring down at what's inside. 

True, I am myself a baker. I have made cakes at home since I was thirteen years old and I have baked continuously since then, trying my hand at restaurant baking as well for a number of years. So you could say I'm just in love with the product that comes out of the oven. Ed notes that I bake mostly to have sweet treats for when Snowdrop comes here after school. He tells me he himself loved to open up a cupboard at his grandma's house and reach for the special cookies she stored there for him. So maybe it is a grandma thing? 

No, it's more than that. Bakeries, coffee shops with pastries -- these institutions are up there for me, as magnificent as the great galleries of the world. As sensual, evocative and pleasurable to frequent as any monument or garden. And so today, I put in my order to Madison Sourdough and head out to pick it up.

(It's such a pretty drive to it, though I admit, having a shop like this within walking distance would be even better!)

All this happens after feeding the animals, of course. My it's nippy out there! Just a few degrees above freezing. Brrr!

Not in the bakery of course, where all is warm, fragrant, delectable and beautiful!

Breakfast, with a split croissant and pain au chocolat and one last posy of dahlias from the garden.

Yeah, the garden. That box filled with a great deal from one of my favorite gardening centers (51 bare root lilies and 100 daffodils and 50 crocuses) is staring at me each time I go in and out of the farmhouse. The lilies need to go in. The bulbs too, but the lilies need to establish themselves now, before a heavy freeze sets in. I'm really pushing it by putting them in this late.

Sigh. It's cold. It's windy. The cheepers are digging up the weeded space in the newly extended sunny bed. And I have to be careful with my eye. Nothing is easy about this job today.

I take out an old cushion Ed once picked up at the curb. He uses it for sitting outside when working on a motor. I throw it down in the middle of the bed hoping that it will keep me from bending down too much (a no-no for my eye) and get to work.

Yesss!! 51 lilies, in the ground. My eye lets me know it's doing just fine. 

In the afternoon, I pick up the girls at school (happiness is bringing friends home!)...

... and transport them back to the house. After making sure there's a snack on the table, I hang back, because this isn't my playdate, its theirs.

(joining in on the snack)

Eventually parents take charge and I return to the farmhouse. 

It's still not dark outside. Out comes the cushion, the spade. In go the daffodils. Just 25, but it's a good start.

Evening. I bake a fish, roast some cauliflower and toss a salad. Candle burns, cats sleep. Good days, quiet nights. A wonderful combination.