A Passionate, Patient Pursuit
Close your eyes. Now think about a time when you walked into a kitchen or bakery where freshly baked bread or cookies just came out of the oven. The air is warm as the sweet fragrant aroma lingers, offering a nostalgic embrace. That first whiff is almost magical, creating a profound sense of comfort and home… transporting you back to a different time and place.
For me, the smell of freshly baked bread takes me back to my grandparents’ cottage in Northern Quebec. My cousins and I are all sitting around the wobbly white kitchen table, and a pound of soft yellow butter waits on a plate. We are all excited and hungry as Grand-maman pulls out a fresh loaf of fluffy white bread from the wood stove.
Grand-maman’s bread tasted as good as it looked and smelled. She set the bar high, and over the years, I have tried to replicate that taste memory, finding the bread-baking process daunting and with less than ideal results — until now.
With Babette’s Bread: Stories, Recipes, and the Fundamental Techniques of Artisan Bread and Crust: Essential Sweets and Savories from Victoria’s Beloved Bakery, two recently released cookbooks, the authors demystify the process of baking, making it feel accessible and achievable. Taking two very different approaches, Babette Kourelos and Tom Moore along with Rebecca Wellman, thoughtfully provide a step-by-step overview, each offering their own baking tips, techniques and processes. Their voices are clear and present, and with each recipe it feels as though they are right there, guiding and encouraging me to be patient and not to give up. Their passion for baking and teaching is inspiring, especially as they both keep reminding me that it should be fun and uncomplicated — even the chapters on making sourdough.
Babette’s Bread
“I tried to keep it simple,” author Babette Kourelos says. “All recipes are related to each other and the only difference is the amount of yeast and liquid.” With Babette’s Bread, Kourelos believes that everyone can be a confident baker. She suggests starting with the simple bread recipes before tackling the more complicated ones, such as sourdough. For Kourelos, it’s all a matter of trial and error and she encourages people to not give up if it doesn’t work out the first time. “Your baking success will require a solid plan (with steps) and a clear vision or goal of what you want to achieve. This requires precision, patience and lots of practice.”
Kourelos also offers instructional photos and detailed illustra- tions of various techniques. These visual cues, her clear explanations of what to expect and fun play on words make her recipes accessible to bakers at all levels. “When doing stretches and folds, you will know when it is ready to be shaped,” Kourelos writes. “It should be puffy and light and giggly. You don’t want it to be a soupy mess as it will be difficult to handle.”
She also offers a thorough overview of key ingredients and recommends only basic tools, as she prefers to knead by hand rather than using a stand mixer. “I love touching the dough, it’s a bit of a workout,” Kourelos says. “But by kneading by hand, you get to know the dough and develop baker’s senses.” Her other favourite tool is a dough scraper, and she never travels without bringing one in her luggage.
Kourelos’ baking journey began in Johannesburg, South Africa. While studying to be a lawyer, baking offered a much-needed creative outlet. She quickly fell in love with the simplicity and honesty of baking bread. “Little did I know how that simple loaf of bread would forever change my life,” Kourelos says.
At 23, she made the difficult decision to forgo a law career to follow her heart, leaving her home to apprentice in the U.S. under the French master baker Gérard Rubaud. Learning the art of old- school artisan bread-baking techniques and the cultivation and maintenance of a traditional French levain, she created her first sourdough culture, and in 2013, she and “Maggie” moved back to South Africa where she started her own baking business.
In 2020, now married, Kourelos, her hus- band, their two Fox Terriers and “Maggie” moved to Langley, B.C. In addition to baking and selling bread, Kourelos began teaching bread-baking courses. During the pandemic, she took another leap of faith and started working on the cookbook proposal. Not long after, she also gave birth to their son, John Alexander.
According to Kourelos, Babette’s Bread is “A reliable guide for baking beautiful, real bread at home.” She wants to show people that baking bread is a simple process, one that can easily fit into anyone’s schedule. Kourelos, who recently moved to Montreal with her family, is now working on a new YouTube series called ‘Bake the Book with Me’, where she plans to bake every recipe in her cookbook. The series will be pre-recorded and free.
Crust
“Baking doesn’t need to be fussy, complicated or intimidating,” says Tom Moore, who wrote Crust with writer and photographer, Rebecca Wellman. The book, which has the same name as the well-known Victoria, B.C., bakery that Moore started with his former wife, Crystal, includes several beloved sweet and savoury recipes from the bakery. “We wanted to write Crust to send a little bit of the Crust Bakery into the kitchens of our visitors,” Moore says.
Moore, who has since remarried and moved on from the bakery, wanted to write a cookbook that included a variety of recipes, some easy and some that offered more of a challenge. Together with Wellman, Moore has recreated the experience of a commercial bakery and modified it for the home kitchen.
The two have also included many family favourites. According to Moore, “Food is love. That feeling of connecting over food and, the appreciation of the bounty we are so fortunate to enjoy, is what I am delighted to share here.” Wellman remembers getting her first cookbook and making dinner for her parents and grandparents. “It was a Canadian Living cookbook and I still have it. Made me happy to see them happy.” Moore is also proud that his daughter Abby loves baking and has included a couple of her recipes.
“Today, some of my favourite times are spent in my home kitchen with my kids, my wife, Pennye, and her two teenagers,” says Moore, who grew up in Australia. “It’s a full house, just like the one I grew up in, with plenty of music, laughter and epic kitchen dance parties.”
Although Crust includes a broad range of recipes, there is a whole chapter devoted to baking bread that includes sourdough. Moore and Wellman believe that creating a viable starter takes a lot of practice, but encourage people not to give up. “Sourdough starter is hardier than we think and more resilient,” says Moore. “Flavour develops over time with all starters.” Not surprising, his starters have been around for a while and all have names with a sentimental connection. “Yanni is the starter we used at Crust, and it is now 11 [years old],” says Moore, who has a new starter called Adam, named after a good friend who passed away last year. The starter has since been split in two, with the other half named Eve.
Moore, who is also a trained chef, strongly encourages people to take the time to learn the basics of baking and to be patient with the process. He offers a thorough overview of basic tools and equipment (including buying a good scale because “proper measurements matter”) as well as the importance of quality ingredients, stressing the need to shop locally and seasonally. He keeps reminding everyone to enjoy the process.
“We learn the best things when we play,” says Moore, who urges people to bake with an open heart and a relaxed attitude. “Have fun, don’t take it too seriously. You are going to make mistakes. Don’t be afraid to own the mistake and figure out what you did wrong.” Wellman also believes that there is “A fine line with baking; stick to it but make it your own. Consistency is a challenge. So many senses involved.”
Wellman and Moore are both busy in their respective careers. Wellman is working on a revised edition of her book First, We Brunch, and the pair have some ideas for another cookbook. Stay tuned.
