Ada Pennick
Head baker, owner
I start at 4:30. By the time I've had a coffee the first loaves are scored.
Came home to Callowford in 2017 after eight years in London bakeries and brought the sourdough with her.
The bakers
Jean opened the shop in 1991. Her daughter Ada came home in 2017 with a sourdough starter and took over the ovens. Tomek does the pastry at night and Priya does the cakes.
Jean Pennick
The shop counter, Fridays' lardy cake
I opened in 1991 with white tins and doughnuts. Ada's changed most things. Not the lardy cake.
Runs the counter and knows most people's usual before they ask.
Tomek Nowak
Night baker, pastry
Croissant dough needs cold hands and a cold room. I have both at 3am.
Laminates the croissant dough the afternoon before, rolls and shapes from 3:30.
Priya Shah
Cakes and orders
Tell me how many people and what they like. I'll tell you the size.
Bakes every cake to order, Wednesday to Saturday. Reads the orders at 8.
After 16 hours proving in the cold, the last hour and a quarter of the Callowford sourdough.
- 05:00
Scored
A single cut with the lame, at an angle, so one side lifts.
- 05:15
Oven spring
In the first minutes the loaf rises fast and the cut opens.
- 05:40
Colour
Above about 140°C the crust browns: that's the Maillard reaction.
- 06:15
Out
Bold baked, the ear dark at its lip, onto the rack.
- 13A baker's dozen. Medieval bakers gave a shop thirteen loaves for twelve: the extra one was the shopkeeper's profit.
- 80%of British bread (2009) is made by the Chorleywood process, flour to sliced loaf in about three and a half hours.
- 1851Nearly a million Bath buns were eaten at the Great Exhibition in five and a half months.