260 Loaves of Bread

When we finished building the Pizzeria in 1979 Mac and I were flat broke, we had no money with which to buy ingredients to make pizzas let alone cutlery, glasses and plates!  However, it was “do or die” time, and we decided to make and sell bread until we had enough cash to buy what was needed to open a restaurant. This baking idea worked like a charm, and it wasn’t long before we were able to serve customers that long-awaited pizza. Making all that bread was very hard work without a dough-mixer, and my shoulders ached badly at day’s end. I was quite young, and determined to succeed; when I look back at those early years I wonder how on earth I coped, I know for a fact I would not be able to work today the way I did when youth was on my side!

Mac’s Pizzeria was open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and it took quite some juggling to get the baked goods in and out of the ovens before they had to be turned up to a higher “pizza” heat for the lunch crowd. Timing was everything; the cinnamon buns, croissants and muffins we served for breakfast had to be made between batches of bread, and although I started baking in the wee hours of the morning, I was usually able to make just 72 loaves of bread. In other words, we were NOT by any means a commercial bakery!

Shortly after we obtained a motor for the old dough-mixer Mac had salvaged, a young Swedish lady appeared at the kitchen door. Lunch was in full swing, and the dining room was packed with customers waiting to be fed. I was hot and sweaty from rolling pizza dough, and had neither the time nor the inclination to indulge in idle chit-chat with the lady. However, when I heard her request I dropped my rolling pin with a clatter and said;

“You want WHAT!!??”

The visitor told me she was in charge of feeding a flotilla of charter boats heading down to the Tobago Cays, and that she needed 260 loaves of bread by 7:00 the next morning. Without batting an eyelid, I asked if she wanted whole wheat or white loaves, treating her order as though it were an every-day occurrence. The lady expressed her gratitude, and paid me on the spot for bread that I was going to have to produce by morning come hell or high water.  It never entered my mind to tell her I couldn’t make that many loaves, Mac and I needed the money!

Thank GAWD we now had a dough-mixer! I told Mac he was going to have to help, we could start baking as soon as the restaurant closed at 10:00 and work through the night until our goal had been reached. I had the breakfast pastries to worry about too, by 8:00 our regular customers would start arriving, and I prepared in advance as much as I was able to before tackling the bread order.

260 loaves of bread (half white, half whole wheat) may not sound like a lot for a commercial bakery, but with our two small pizza ovens we were in for a hell of a night. Mac turned on the kitchen speakers for the stereo, and inserted the first of many fast-moving rock ‘n roll cassettes. We literally danced as we worked, bopping to the music as the dough-mixer and pizza ovens worked their magic. We stayed hydrated with Heineken beers, and got quite a buzz going as the night progressed! We ran out of counter space quickly, and had to use every single table in the dining room to hold the cooling racks of bread.

At exactly 7:00 two men mounted the steps to the restaurant, and gazed with horror at the mounds of neatly bagged loaves covering the tables. Mac and I, quite wasted from all the beer and giddy from lack of sleep, laughed at the men’s expressions as they tried to figure out how the two of them were going to transfer all that bread in one dinghy. Evidently the lady who had ordered the loaves thought she was buying the small “penny breads” sold in the shops, not large sandwich loaves, and it took the men several trips in their dinghy until they had taken all the bread for which I had been pre-paid. On their return from the Cays, the Swedish lady made a point of telling me that although the loaves had taken up a lot of space on the boats, every crumb had been devoured because the sailors liked it so much. She had been teased relentlessly about the 260 loaves she had bought, and felt justified when it was all consumed.

Now that I have retired I still make bread, not because I HAVE to but because I like to bake.  I sell some of the loaves to a select group of people, and if they complain I will simply delete their names from my list. I usually make rather unusual loaves such as breadfruit, turmeric, pumpkin and coconut, nice crusty bread that my husband and I enjoy. To date none of my customers have complained, and that’s the way I like it!