I’ve always loved a good television commercial. My favorite commercials are the lifestyle-montages that resemble my Pinterest fantasies: videos filled with images of beautiful homes, claw-foot bathtubs on the beach, and my new favorite, watching the older-male baker, joyously baking treats.

I recently decided that my new calling in life was to be a professional baker. I’d get up early, put on my apron and spend my day covered in powder-soft organic flour which I would mold into crunchy-on-the-outside, pillow-soft on the inside bread and layered cakes that look like the things I’ve seen on Instagram.

I’d put smiles on dozens of faces, and happiness in their bellies, and at the end of my shift, I’d take off my apron, and retire for the day, until I got up to do it all over again.

Joy.

Pure Joy.

Just like the man in the commercial.

I got lucky, a local, reputable bakery was looking for a baker, and they were willing to train. Sure, the money was terrible, but the hours were ideal, set hours, done by 1:30. I’d bake happiness and have the afternoon to myself to go to the gym, and make YouTube videos.

Done.

And done.

I interviewed and got the job. My dream of being a professional baker was going to come true.

The reality is that the baking was split into two categories. Baker, and Production. The baker bakes bread, muffins, pastries, and cookies. Production gets to work on cakes, tarts, and other pretty sweets.

The Baker, (my job) starts at 5am. She bakes off bread (pre-made, partially baked), muffins (pre-made batter), and pastries (pre-prepared & frozen / and when necessary egg-washed). This all needs to be done in a couple of hours so the baker has time to place these items on trays and in baskets, complete with the correct signage – which displays the name and ingredients lists of each item.

The baker then takes stock of what’s on the floor. This can be anything from muffins (which come in various quantities and sizes) to pastries, to teacakes, and breakfast bars … and then she bakes those things.

Next, she bakes the cookies (pre-made / frozen) for the lunchtime crowd.

And then, another round of inventory. This time, counting all of the cookie and pie-like items on the shelves.

And again, she bakes to fill this pre-determined quota.

The truth is, I never touched any flour. Not once. I never formed dough into loaves of bread. I never mixed any muffin or cookie batter. The biggest contribution I ever made was adding frozen blueberries or chocolate chips to pre-made muffin batter. Oh, and I was required to dot the tops of muffins with their appropriate toppings, pumpkin seeds for pumpkin muffins, oats on top of vegan oat muffins, and that horrible course/sanding sugar I was forced to put on blueberry muffins (I’m morally opposed to sanding sugar on ANYTHING, especially corn muffins, thankfully I wasn’t asked to do that).

At first, I was disappointed that I was going to be working with pre-made-everything, but once I realized exactly how much work there was to do, I was grateful. Honestly, I had moments when I wondered why we were even bothering to bake the cookies that went into the large tubs on the bakery floor. I had always assumed that those were baked and packaged at a nearby facility anyhow – did customers even know that they were baked and packaged in-house?

So why did I retire from baking after 3 weeks?

 

It wasn’t the hours.

Getting up at 3:45 a.m. is a bitch but being done at 1:30 is wonderful.

 

Working with pre-made elements wasn’t the issue either.

Baking things, that are pre-made, isn’t as gratifying or romantic as baking from scratch but when you’re hustling to get it all done – you’re so glad to have pre-made, pre-baked, pre-mixed, everything.

 

The Oven?

Standing next to a rather large vault-like oven all day is my idea of heaven. I can never be warm enough. Two layers of clothing, (including a sweatshirt), an apron, and a hot oven – that’s the one thing I’ll miss.

The hard part was baking everything off in time. I was undeniably the slowest baker they’ve ever had. Day by day, I gained a bit of speed, but not enough to ever feel the joy of the baking experience. It was just too stressful for me. Every time I tried to speed up, I would make a mistake, or reach for a hot rack without a glove. For me speed meant injury to myself or worse, making an error that could harm one of the many trusting customers who seek out this bakery because of the many vegan, fat-free, correctly labeled food-items that allow them to live their safe/healthy lifestyles. With all this in mind, I chose to only move as fast as I could – to keep all involved safe and healthy.

There was another issue – I could stand next to an oven all day, but running between a hot workspace, the walk-in fridge (which was tolerable), and the walk-in freezer (my own personal hell) was wreaking hell on my skin and my soul. I invested in a small coat and gloves to make my time in the freezer easier – but being in a freezer, with the fans blowing, while on a short ladder, and reaching up over my head to pull down 20-30 lb boxes of cookies (at least that’s how heavy they felt) was just pure hell for me – and my body.

And lastly, being on my feet for a solid 8 hours – with no mats or padding – well, that didn’t feel good either. Somehow being hunched over a counter for 8 hours was just so much worse than being on my feet for 8 hours, doing anything else.

Two weeks had passed and I knew I needed to assess my situation. I was getting faster with each day – but not by much. The holidays were just around the corner, and the demand for baked-things would grow significantly – far more than I could handle. And remember how I told you that this job included training? Well, that training lasted exactly one day – not nearly enough in my book. I decided, I would ask for additional training. It seemed a reasonable request. After all, I don’t think anyone interprets a job posting that reads

Baker [will train]

to mean that the trainee would learn everything they need to know (including tips and tricks on how to bake in a speedy manner) in an 8-hour session. My wish was granted. I’d get another day of training. Surely I would get lots of tips and tricks and be making time – in no time.

I was feeling optimistic, and ready to conquer this baking-gig, but then, my emotional tide-pool shifted.

I was noticing the little cuts on my skin – the ones I got from moving back and forth between an extremely warm bakery to an unbearably cold walk-in freezer. I could feel soreness and pain in my shoulders, legs and back, a pain that I hadn’t felt in ages, and hoped to never have to live with again, and worse I had visions of living with this pain day-in and day-out as long as I had this job.

I imagined myself on that ladder, in that freezer reaching for boxes on a top shelf, stacked five high, that I simply have a hard time managing and I imagined myself moving speedily, and forgetting where I was, and burning myself on the inside of the oven door, or falling off a ladder in a cramped, overfilled, all-too-small, walk-in freezer.

I baked, for one more week. Breakfast was out by 8am’ish (on average about 5 minutes late), lunch cookies were done early, and as for the rest, let’s just say, I did my best to bake as much as I could as quickly as I could and leave it at that. Yes, my body still ached, but I didn’t burn myself, and I didn’t fall off of any ladders, and all of the vegan, fat-free, and nut, items were baked and labeled correctly.

I’ve officially retired from being a baker but I haven’t left baking behind. The early rise, and the long days on my feet have only deepened my appreciation for each and every bite of bread and cake I’ll ever eat for the rest of my life. I walk away knowing that I put that feeling of joy in more than a few bellies, but most of all, I feel a greater sense of joy when I can take my time, sifting small mounds of pillow-soft-flour, leveling measuring cups of sugar and adding as much or as little of anything as I want to create the confections of my dreams. This pastime is joyous once more and I couldn’t be more grateful.

Much love to hard-working bakers, the world over and the joy you’ve put in my belly.

 

* The ad referenced is for Chantix