Hey guyssss.
Me again. After over a month. Again.
I’m sure y’all are pretty used to the sparse posts in these parts as of late. (Sorryyyy). I was nagged by my family (hi Aki!) about the blog neglect.
Just because I haven’t been doing much blog baking, doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy baking away!
I started working at a bakery in San Anselmo (MH Bread & Butter) about a month ago as a pastry baker! I’ve been doing the morning bake of scones, muffins, cookies, etc. and CROISSANTS. Oh the croissants.
My life is entirely consumed by laminated dough. I dream about layers. Literally.
Twice a week I laminate (make croissant dough), and three times a week I do ‘the bake’ alternating with the other pastry baker. My shift is 3am to 11am! Not too shabby. Have the afternoons to relax and do things (cough…should be blogging but am usually too tired). I bake the croissants for the case, and we have a PM shift that comes in to do the wholesale bake.
I thought since I haven’t been doing much on here I should at least give a quick update about my new job and such. So here are some fun photos of what I do at MH. 😀
Croissant shaping at 3am. I come in and shape usually 2 to 2 1/2 blocks of dough.
Me with the croissants! Look surprisingly awake for 3am. 🙂
The life of a croissant! After shaping, after proofing and after baking. Amazing what yeast can do! 🙂
Chocolate croissant shaping! One of my favorites to shape. Aren’t they cuuute? We use Valrhona. <3
Chocolate croissants after proofing, ready to egg wash, slash and bake. Lil pillows of love! And look at those layers!! 😀
Chocolate croissants baked!
Ham and cheese croissant shaped. I want to make a vegetarian savory option sometime.
Morning bun assembly. Croissant dough filled with cinnamon orange zest organic sugar. So yummy.
Morning buns baked and tossed in organic sugar.
Kouign Amann assembly. My absolute favorite thing at the bakery, and I’m totally addicted. I make these on days I laminate. Croissant dough with vanilla sugar sheeted in, and rolled and baked in more vanilla sugar.
The caramel-y underside of the kouign amann after baking. Love it.
Frangipane croissants after baking. Day old croissants soaked in rum simple syrup and filled with frangipane, baked and dusted with powdered sugar.
Laminating! Twice a week I laminate, either with a 10 block or 12 block recipe. Meaning 10 or 12 blocks of dough.
Cross section of one of the blocks. You can see all the layers of dough and butter! We divide some blocks in half for the PM baking shift for more croissants, and the AM shift to make morning buns.
Here’s a little Snapchat video I sent out on a laminating day. Shows some of the steps of making croissant dough! Terrible iPhone pictures, but ya get gist.
So that’s the croissant part of what I do at MH! I also bake quiche and quiche shells (no photos of those yet) and fill the case with all of our pastry items on days I do the bake. The rest is production stuff… so making muffin batters, cookie dough, scones etc.
When I was hired there was a transition in the pastry department, as the ‘pastry chef’ (loose term because things aren’t super formal there) left and was replaced. Now with the new pastry chef, Teresa, we’re going to be sprucing up the pastry case, getting new items in and trying fun things!
I’m still pretty new and am working on getting the schedule down, and getting faster at everything. But I can’t wait to help out with these changes! That was one of my favorite parts of working at The Sweet Life. Trying out new recipes and seeing how they sell or compliment the case.
It’s funny being in the same building as The Sweet Life (the bakery that I worked at 3 years ago which MH Bread & Butter ‘replaced’). All of the equipment etc is the same, but the business is entirely different. It’s really been a great place to work so far, and I’m learning sooo much.
It’s so interesting to see how businesses run differently, and especially with MH’s wholesale side. It is tremendously useful for me to gain all kinds of experience at this point in my career, and wholesale is definitely one of those that would be advantageous down the line if I consider opening a place of my own someday. Seeing how that works has been really great.
Croissants terrified me before this job. Even after culinary school I was super scared to deal with them. But now, I do it 5 times a week! 😀 Can’t wait to see where things go in the next few months with my skills, timing and everything.
Hope the update was interesting enough, and I’ll try my best to get this blog going again with some home baking! Thanks for reading! <3
It sounds like this will be a good place to learn at this time in your career and they are lucky to have your talent and commitment. We loved the Kouign-amann puff paste “cakes”and the fresh-tasting carrot muffins. Classic, delicate flavors with surprising complexity!