A Second Bite at the Apple (8 page)

That isn't fair. Fifty dollars is better than zero dollars. Although when I divide fifty by the hours I'll need to spend writing and formatting this newsletter, it's basically slave labor. But at least I can use the columns as clips for an actual food-writing or producing job. By now, the stories I wrote and produced at Northwestern are almost five years old, so having fresh material will make me more employable. At least I hope so.

The following Monday, I borrow Heidi's car and drive out to Rick's bakehouse in West Virginia, about an hour and a half outside Washington, DC. As part of my first profile, Rick agreed to let me visit the place where all of the “magic” happens, but as I turn onto a narrow, bumpy road in what seems to be the middle of nowhere, I sense this afternoon will be anything but magical.

I bounce along in Heidi's 1999 Honda Accord, swerving around potholes the size of Texas as I pass seemingly endless stretches of rolling hills and farmland. As I careen around a bend in the road, I spot Rick's driveway, a dirt lane that winds up a broad hill to a white clapboard farmhouse at the top.

From a distance, the house looks quaint, a bright white cottage perched atop a grassy knoll, looking down upon the apple orchards and cornfields. But as I get closer, the charm wears off. The roof shingles cling precariously to the top of the house, standing on end like flakes of dandruff. Several of the black shutters hang at a crooked angle, dangling by one corner like loose teeth, and the white clapboard exterior is covered in dust and dirt. It's what I imagine the “Little House on the Prairie” might look like if it were run by Miss Havisham.

I pull up beside an old, rusty pickup truck and make my way to Rick's dusty black front door, where I rap a dingy brass knocker to announce my arrival. Flakes of black paint sprinkle to the ground like confetti.

“Well, well, well, look who it is.” He frowns as he glances down at my tote bag, which is filled with a reporter's notebook, pens, a digital voice recorder, and a small video recorder I bought in college, along with a mini tripod. “You know I'm not paying you extra for this, right?”

“Julie said she'd pick up the tab for the gas.”

“All this for some dinky newsletter?”

“It isn't dinky. Apparently the subscriber list is huge. You should be thrilled—your profile will be front and center.”

“Do I look like the kind of person who gets thrilled?” I stare at him blankly. “Exactly,” he says. “Come on—let's get to work.”

I follow Rick around the front of the house and continue onto a crushed gravel path, which leads to a converted barn adjacent to the main farmhouse. Like the main house, the outside of the barn is made of white clapboard and, also like the main house, appears to be falling apart. But as Rick slides open the thick, black barn door, the glint of stainless steel and bright lights catches my eye as the interior of the bakehouse comes into view. Glistening, rectangular stainless steel tables fill the room, which is lined with wire bakers' racks, fancy ovens, proofing racks, and dozens of scales, scoops, and plastic tubs. Two mixers sit in the back corner, both so large I could fit inside the mixing bowl and still have room for a friend. There are baskets and barrels of flour and more mixing bowls than I've ever seen. And unlike the rest of the property, which seems to be on the verge of collapse, the inside of the barn is immaculate.

“Wow, Rick—this is amazing.”

“For the amount it cost me, it'd better be. I'll be paying off the loans on that oven until I die.” He points across the room to an enormous metal contraption that is attached to a wide chimney at the back of the barn.

“Is that a wood-fired oven?”

“You bet your tits it is.”

I'd rather not involve my tits in any of today's happenings. Frankly, when it comes to Rick, I'd like to keep my tits to myself.

Rick gives me a quick tour of the bakehouse and a brief history of his business. He started Wild Yeast a decade ago, but before that he'd been baking for more than two decades, having spent time in France learning from many of the bread-baking greats: Lionel Poilâne, Bernard Ganachaud, Jean-Luc Poujauran. He has served his bread to four US presidents and two dictators, and in recent years, he has toyed with the idea of milling his own grain.

“But unless a wad of cash drops from the sky, that ain't happening,” he says.

“I heard Green Grocers might start selling more local products. Maybe it'll be a windfall for you.”

“Doubtful,” he says. “And even if it were, I'm in debt up to my eyeballs. Between the loans for this damn bakehouse and the bills for my wife's surgery, it'll take a freaking miracle to get me out of this hole.”

“I didn't realize your wife was sick.”

More to the point, I didn't realize Rick had a wife. That poor woman. Either she is some sort of masochist, or she is as batshit crazy as he is.

“She isn't sick. The old cow needed a knee replacement. I've needed a hip replacement for years, but she got her surgery first. We lost our health insurance, so Lord knows when we'll be able to afford mine. I used to be a much nicer guy before my hip started hurting like hell.”

“Ah,” I say.
For the sake of humanity, someone get this man a hip replacement immediately.

“Anyway,” he says, “enough business talk. I thought you wanted to bake bread.”

“I do. Let me just . . .”

I pull out my video camera and tripod and begin setting up next to one of the stainless steel tables.

“What's all this?” Rick asks. “I thought this was for some stinking newsletter.”

“It is. But I have a food blog, too, and I wanted to post a little video on it. Let people peek behind the Wild Yeast curtain.”

He winks. “You can peek behind my curtain any time.”

I set up my camera and begin filming as Rick pulls a large tub of sourdough starter from his walk-in refrigerator. The starter—or “levain,” as he calls it—is based on a strain of yeast more than a hundred years old, and as he dips his hands into the bubbling, liquidy mixture the color of café au lait, the air fills with the tangy, sweet smell of fresh yeast. He transfers a hunk of starter into a large blue plastic bowl and begins adding more flour and water, using his fat bear paws to knead the flour into the loose, sticky dough. He works quickly but with care, and I zoom in to make sure I get enough close-up shots of the silky smooth dough to edit into the sequence later. I have to admit: It's refreshing to see Rick in this setting, to confirm that he can be someone other than a misogynistic troglodyte.

“This batch won't be ready to go into the oven for another ten hours,” he says as he removes the tacky dough from his fingers with a white plastic bench scraper.

“Ten hours?” There's no way in hell I'm staying here for ten hours.

“Don't get your panties in a bunch,” he says.

Again: I'd really, really prefer it if Rick wouldn't talk about my tits
or
my panties.

“I have another batch ready to go in the oven in a few minutes,” he continues. “Relax.”

He pulls out a proofing rack lined with baskets called ban-netons, each filled with a puffed mound of pale dough, and as he does, my cell phone rings from within my tote bag. I pause the camera. “Can you hold on just one second? I need to take this.” For all I know, it could be a response to one of my many job applications.

“Oh, sure. Because I don't have better things to do . . .”

“I'll just be a sec.”

I run over to my tote and grab my phone. I don't recognize the number. “Hello?”

“Hey, Sydney? It's Jeremy.” He waits for me to respond, but I don't. “I just wanted to touch base about tomorrow night.” He waits again. “Hello?”

“Hi—sorry.” My mouth goes dry. I'd forgotten he might call about tomorrow night. I guess I'd been hoping he'd forgotten, too. “I think . . . I think we have a bad connection.”

“I can hear you fine,” he says. “Can you hear me?”

“I . . . Yeah, I can hear you.” I am my own worst enemy.

“Okay, cool. Anyway, I was thinking we could meet up at Rasika—assuming you like Indian. It's hard to get a table, but I managed to pull a few strings.”

“Um . . . actually . . . I've had a change of plans. I can't meet up.”

“Oh. Okay. How about Thursday?”

I hold my breath and rack my brain for an excuse. “That's not going to work either. I have . . . a thing.”

A thing? What does that even mean?

Jeremy goes quiet on the other end of the phone. “Oh,” he finally says. “That's too bad.”

Rick slaps a huge hunk of dough onto one of the other steel tables, smacking it repeatedly against the surface with a loud bang. “You're missing another crucial step, sweetheart,” he shouts above the din. “Post-mixing, pre-banneton.”

“Where are you?” Jeremy asks as Rick slams the dough again with a loud
thwack
.

“In West Virginia. Long story.” I glance over my shoulder as Rick heaves the dough onto the table, beating it into submission against the cool, steel surface. “I'm actually in the middle of something, so I can't really talk right now.”

“Oh. Okay.” Jeremy waits for me to fill the silence, but when I don't, he says, “I'd really like to see you again.”

“Sometime
today,
sweetheart?” Rick shouts across the room.

“Listen, I have to go,” I say.

“Okay . . . Should I call you later?”

I hesitate, wondering if I should tell him the real reason behind my sudden disinterest. But as Rick gives me the evil eye from across the room, I decide I don't have time for a full-fledged confrontation. So instead, I simply say, “Probably not.”

Before Jeremy can say anything else, I hang up and head back to my camera, trying to fix my mind on the task at hand. I focus the lens on Rick as he continues to wrestle the huge slab of dough, and as I do, I tell myself cutting a shill like Jeremy loose was the right decision, even though a small part of me isn't so sure.

 

Four hours later, after shaping two dozen loaves of sourdough and baking off two dozen more, I head back to DC, the passenger seat of Heidi's car covered in bags filled with leftovers and castaways from Rick's bakehouse. As I gnaw at a hunk of day-old cranberry pecan bread, my mom calls. Normally I wouldn't attempt answering the phone while stuffing my face with one hand and driving someone else's car with the other, but I owe her a call. Also, considering I just spent five hours with Rick, I could use a little interaction with someone who doesn't belong in an asylum.

“Hi, sweetie,” my mom says. “How are you?”

“Pretty good,” I say, my mouth full of cranberry-studded bread.

“Did I catch you in the middle of something? I can call back.”

“No, now is fine.” I swerve around a pothole, steering with one hand as I grip the phone with the other, and accidentally run over a huge tree branch. “Shit!”

“Excuse me?”

“Sorry—I just nearly blew out one of Heidi's tires.”

“You're driving? Sydney, we've been over this. What have I told you about talking on the phone while driving?”

I tuck the phone between my shoulder and ear and reach for a broken oatmeal raisin cookie. “Stop worrying.” I toss a chunk of cookie into my mouth. “I'm fine.”

“No, you're not fine. You're driving. And apparently eating! Are you even holding the steering wheel?”

“I'm using my knees.”

“Sydney!”

I giggle. “I'm kidding. Of course I'm holding the steering wheel.”

“I'm hanging up. We can talk later.”

“Don't hang up. I'll put you on speaker. I could use the company right now.”

She sighs. “Fine. But you keep your eyes on the road, understood? And no eating.”

“I don't know. . . . These oatmeal raisin cookies are pretty amazing. Like toasty little bites of heaven.”

“Sydney . . .”

“Okay, okay. No eating.” I put the phone on speaker and rest it on the dashboard.

“So why are you in Heidi's car?” she asks. “Job interview?”

I groan. “I wish. No, I was interviewing the baker I've been helping at the farmers' market.”

“For that newsletter thing?”

“And my blog.”

“Your blog? I thought you gave that up years ago.”

“I did. But I've resurrected it.”

“Shouldn't you be focusing on enterprises that are more . . . lucrative?”

I grip the steering wheel tightly with both hands. “Listen, I know you think my blog is silly—”

“I don't think it's silly. I think it's great. I've always loved your food columns. But you've been out of work for two months now, and it doesn't sound as if these farmers' market jobs pay all that much.”

“That's for sure. . . .”

“I just don't want to see you get in over your head, money-wise.”

“Trust me, neither do I. But the job market is really rough right now. Especially for someone trying to shift career tracks.”

She grunts. “Don't I know it.”

Normally I'd say my mom, who has been a stay-at-home mom for the past twenty-six years, knows as much about the job market as she does about x-ray crystallography. But something about her tone piques my curiosity.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Well . . .” She clears her throat. “You know things at home have been a little . . . tight, money-wise. . . .”