Totally Baked

Saturday. We're going to ship about 30,000 loaves of bread this week. That's meant record baking levels at Zingerman's Bakehouse. They've scheduled 12 hour shifts and are making more loaves today— 9,000 — than ever before. They're still all made by hand with an attention to detail that is hard to fathom. Below are pictures I took today inside the bakery. All the while I shot there was a single man hand peeling New Mexico roasted chiles for the Chile Cheddar bread. He was the only one standing still. Everyone else was practically running from table to oven.

Some forgotten trivia I remembered today: the first year I worked at Zingerman's Mail Order we did our holiday shipping out of the Bakehouse. Every day I dusted flour off of all the food. Our biggest day was 113 boxes. This year it's 9,500.

8 Grain 3 Seed going into the second oven.

Tubs of Chocolate Sourdough mix, forming it into rounds at the bench.

Chocolate Cherry, ready to go on the rack to the oven.

Chocolate Cherry, slit with a razor on top, heading into the stone hearth oven.

Pecan Raisin getting slit with a razor before heading into the oven.

Farm Bread baskets, before they're floured and the dough is added.

Farm Bread proofing, one stop on its 18 hour journey from flour to finished loaf.

Shawna, Bakehouse bread leader, figuring out how many loaves her crew can bake tomorrow.

Frank, the Bakehouse's founder.