I didn’t get as many ideas from Steve Jenkins as I had hoped. Zanne Stewart, the former food editor of Gourmet Magazine and one of my favorite people, wrote, “ I’ll be eager to learn what Steve has to say. He’s one of my favorites and, possibly, the most entertaining of all…”  Me too. We […]

This, my first essay in some time, is an open letter to Steve Jenkins. You may not know his name but food people do as he really invented artisan cheese in America.  Well, that is to say he was the first person I know about who began to import really good cheeses from Europe and market […]

            We are now into our second week; and I find that during the first week, even though I was about as gracious as I am capable of being, I thanked customers far less than they thanked me:             “Thank you for doing this.”             “Welcome back to the neighborhood.” […]

The question I have been asked most frequently over the last months is, as I have said here, “When will you open?” I can answer that now: Today at 7 am. We are open and crowded and didn’t make nearly enough bagels, English muffins, and morning pastry. The second question I have been asked over […]

On Friday, we hung our photographs and the marble countertops and tables were installed.  Bruce Flippens of the D.C. Health Department returned to see whether we had done what he asked us to do and he then he approved our opening. And so we will open on Tuesday morning. This bakery is beautiful.  It’s like […]

We didn’t pass our health inspection yesterday and it was a great experience. That dreaded inspection is the penultimate step toward opening and I had been led to believe that it would be a horrible experience.  Indeed, I didn’t sleep much the night before – I mean it. But it was not a horrible experience.  […]

I feel a certain sad symmetry this morning as I wait for our health department inspection to be conducted in a few hours – the final requirement we must fulfill before we open Bread Furst. Dahmane Benarbane, the owner of Baguette Republic, a wholesale bakery in Chantilly, called me yesterday to tell me that the […]

Our resident caffinologist, John Flemming, pursues perfection. It’s inconceivable to him that we who have bought a $12,000 espresso machine hesitate before spending another $1,500 to buy a reverse osmosis water filter (whatever that is).    Can you imagine my not wanting to dig into our marble front counter a hole for his spray rinse […]

Pepco came.  Washington Gas came.  Pepco installed its meter and turned on the power and Washington Gas installed its meter and gave us gas. We completed our construction and our oven technician came from California to turn on the ovens and heat them gently to 450 degrees over two days.  We made a test batch […]

Look at the comments made from time to time about what I write here and the questions asked. Wonderful, useful comments and very few questions – other than one now being asked several times each day:   It’s a reasonable question to ask us after all these weeks of construction. We have a bit to […]