Florin

I have had such a wonderful response to the article about Transilvania Peasant Bread in the Bakers Journal! I have been answering phone calls all summer and trying my best to reply to the sudden explosion of interest in artisan bread. If you haven't read the article yet, visit Baking with Focus at the Bakers Journal website.

Here are some tips for all of you bread lovers out there: If you have an uncomfortable feeling that someone has put a spell on you, the remedy is availabile at your nearest boulangerie. Wrap a piece of bread in a clean white napkin, give it to the first person you meet in the morning. The spell will be lifted. Always burn any bread crumbs that have fallen from the table. If you don't, there is a strong possibility that you will have to return after your death to spend eternity gathering up bread crumbs with your eyelids, or with a bottomless basket. (From Confessions of a French baker: breadmaking secrets, tips, and recipes by Peter Mayle and Gerard Auzet) Enjoy! Florin

The Bread Bakers Guild's goals are a very good starting point and make a lot of sense. And the Guild is doing a hell of a job trying to achieve those goals. The people who run the Guild and those who participate in it's activities are some of the most enthusiastic and selfless bakers, teachers and mentors I've ever seen. I've been a member of the Guild for a number of years now and I'm making a point of participating in at least one event every year. The most accessible such event for Vancouver folks is the Summer Loaf that takes place in Portland every August. Last September I had the privilege of being one of 215 (one of six Canadian) bakers to participate in Camp Bread, a three day baking orgy that took place in San Francisco. I learned a lot, I made a lot of friends and I met some of the Gods of bread baking. Here's the news: Artisan Baking is alive and kicking; and some of it is starting to happen here in Vancouver too. For those interested in learning more about Camp Bread, I can e-mail a PDF (rather large; 8.5 MB) of the Guild's newsletter dedicated to this event. Florin

My name is Florin Moldovan and I am the owner of Transilvania Peasant Bread on West Broadway. I have just recently discovered and joined the eGullet Society. To my surprise I discovered there is a topic dedicated to the Transilvania bakery. I am very honoured to see that the feedback is mostly positive (probably due to the whole Dracula mystique). However, this is not why I am writing here. I am writing because, for a while now I was considering starting some sort of forum where one can discuss (artisan) bread with a particular emphasis on our own city: Vancouver, BC. The only problem is, I don’t have a web site and I don’t have a lot of time on my hands (being a baker and all). I am happy to see that there already is a quite lively discussion topic on bread in Vancouver and I would like to become a part of it if there are no objections. I’d like to try to share some of my passion for bread and even some of my knowledge whenever I will have some spare time. Maybe in time others in the bakers’ community would like to join this forum. Artisan baking is only just starting to take off here and it needs all the support it can get. That being said, here’s my first posting: A little something is bothering me ever since I started reading the postings on this site. There are some who are trying to make Cobs look like pure evil. In my opinion, someone or something dedicated to making bread cannot be essentially bad. There has to be something positive one can say about Cobs. And no, I don’t work for Cobs, but they are after all my colleagues. Florin