Introduction

More than a decade ago I watched one of those "meet the maker" type videos (like the ones you see on the Magnolia network) that never left me. The maker was a former practicing attorney who decided to open a storefront bakery. He didn't seem to regret it for an instant. There were a lot of similarities between us. We were both attorneys. Both people of color. Both of us wanted a different profession. Both of us loved to bake. He wanted to be a professional baker. While at the time didn't even realize this was an option. But it opened my eyes. His story, enthusiasm, and happiness resonated with me and I never forgot it.

Slow forward ten plus years later. Here I am. Trying to make a go of a long held dream I didn't really realize was still here until recently. This isn't my first dream chasing rodeo. But it is the first time I've attempted this. I absolutely believe that enthusiasm coupled with naïveté is an absolute prerequisite for chasing a dream. Both get you off the ground. They don't get you to cruising altitude, but they do get you lift. I know this from experience of having had a successful business for ten years in my other career. But, I had forgotten the take off turbulence a new business owner experiences. That's the naïveté. You don't know, what you don't know, until you figure out, Lord I need to know that! I feel like I have those days, every day and have much to share. But, let's keep it simple.

5 Things I've Had to Learn Very Quickly As a Professional Baker

1. You must have master recipes.

When you're a home baker you work under two basic premises. First, you have go to recipes that you repeat for the same thing (i.e. your sugar cookie or pound cake recipe) with the same flavors. Second, you look to Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, cookbooks, and magazines for new recipes to try to potentially add to your go to recipes if they're good enough. In professional baking you do nothing of the sort.

A bakery has three to four master recipes. Those recipes are the basis for every single offering and flavor provided. There is never a change in the foundation, which is the master recipe. There is only change in the frostings, toppings or fillings that are offered. I started my bakery without knowing I had to do this, let alone why. Now I have master recipes, and I understand why.

2. Quality control is key.

You may not have thought about this, but do you know why McDonalds is the most successful fast food franchise in the world, and worth the most? I read that one of the reasons is because no matter where you are, you know that you're going to get the same tasting French fries, burgers &c... each and every time. It's the same for a bakery. There are a number of ways to do that. One of them is what I mentioned above. Master recipes give you that quality control. Every vanilla mini cake, cupcake &c...is going to taste exactly the same. So should each buttercream flavor, filling, and topping. Nothing can and should be left to chance.

3. Test, Test, Test.

Chef Wolfgang Puck has said, "When you have made as many mistakes as I have, then you can be as good as me." Master recipes are tested for consistency, but surprisingly they may not work in all circumstances and with all fillings or toppings. For example, I have a master white cookie recipe. I call it my Blanc cookie (which sounds fancier but it just means "white" cookie). It's perfect for delicate cookies with toppings, white chocolate and probably frostings (but I haven't tested it yet, so I'm not sure). But my master Blanc recipe is not good for a chocolate chip cookies. When tested it did not provide the same visual cues and texture, I or customer expect and want in a chocolate chip cookie. Therefore I had to take the master cookie recipe and recalculate the sugar ratios, to give me the chocolate chip cookie I sell in the bakery. Now that is my master thin chocolate chip cookie recipe. It's great for adding all sorts of other chips in it. However... when I was coming up with the idea of a celebration chocolate chip cookie for birthday boxes where I added natural sprinkles inside, the composition of the cookie totally changed. It lost its texture and chewiness. The cooking time was totally off. It was back to the testing drawing board. All this to say, that I did learn quickly that if you have a certain standard for yourself and your bakery you cannot just put things out. You have to test, test, test.

4. Weigh everything.

What is the largest difference between a home baker and a professional? Home bakers measure everything by volume. Professional bakers measure everything by weight. It makes a huge difference!! I never knew when I was just home baking that volume measurements are provided in recipes for ease. Almost everyone has measuring cups. Few people have food scales (at least in the United States). But measuring by volume is the least accurate way to execute a recipe. Why is that? For two reasons. Measuring cups are packed differently from person to person. One person might lightly pack their flour while another may compact it. Secondly, different brands of sugar, flour &c. weigh differently.

The easiest way to understand this is converting a gluten recipe to a gluten free (gf) recipe with a 1 to 1 gf flour. White and wheat flour is much heavier than gf flour. So if your recipe calls for 1 cup regular flour, chances are your 1 cup gf flour will not be enough...but not always!! I found out through some recipe testing that weight or our ingredient means everything in baking.

I had a regular recipe that I wanted to test using gf four. The recipe called for 3/4 cup flour, which is 6 ounces. I weighed out six ounces of gf flour. My recipe was a disaster. As I'm apt to do, I asked chat what went wrong. Chat asked me the weight of my flour in grams per tbsp, which it had to explain to me was on the back above the nutrition information. I told it. Turned out that I had but in too much flour for the recipe! What I had to learn as a professional baker very quickly was that everything had to be weighed, and in grams. Because grams is the unit of measurement used for weight for all ingredients, it creates superb accuracy in baking.

5. Customers really do want the biggest.

When I first started my bakery I was more set on quality than quantity. I still am. No one will come back if the quality isn't good. I took my weekly sweet treat box idea (which started out as being called a pastry box) from Cecilia Tolone an American former pastry chef at a Swedish Michelin starred restaurant. Her pastries are nice, delicate and small by American standards. I mimicked that. Plus, I've never really like huge pastries to begin with. One day at a pick up one of my customers said while looking into the box I just handed him, "I'll give her (his adult daughter) the biggest one." That got me thinking. I'm not a patisserie where you get perfectly flavored, balanced, beautifully crafted within an inch of its life pastries. But I also don't have to be or want to be a Brooki Bakery providing monster stuffed cookies. I needed more of a middle. So I increase the size of my bars, brownies and certain cookies. But that's not what this is ultimately about. It's about weighing and measuring. Now when a customer purchases from me I know in my mind there isn't a biggest. Their eyes are deceiving them if they think there is. That is because pans of bars are literally measured with a ruler before cutting to make every bar the same size. Each dough for one cookie is measured to the exact gram. No matter how it looks it is the exact same size. This is what all professional bakers and bakeries do (or should). There is no biggest because weights and measurements aren't left to chance; for customer satisfaction and cost control reasons. That was something I had to learn.

Conclusion

I hope that provides you with some knowledge about what goes into Saturday Sweets. Plus you get to follow me on the journey of failures (which there will be lots of) and successes (which there will be lots of as well)! If you're new to the baking business or want to pursue it, I would advise you start with number one, create master recipes immediately! I wish I had known this when I began. They will be the hallmark of your business.

If there are other things you'd like me to discuss, just leave a comment below!!

Remember, life is what you bake it.