Tony Hatfield's Retired Ramblings

Thirty Minutes for Buns!

If any one could bottle the aroma they could make a fortune. I’ve said that dozens on times as I’ve bought a couple of hundred grams of salami and some grana from the small Italian Deli a mile or so outside Newcastle. OK it’s not Valvona and Crolla, but there are few things from the peninsular Nico, the proprietor, doesn’t stock or will not order for you! Enter any Italian pasticceria and the nose is immediately bathed in the smell of cooked pastries, almonds and, if you are lucky, very lucky, the aroma of cooking dough. But it’s easy to overlook more homegrown pleasures. I’ve been buying bread and cakes from “West View Bakery”, our local “craft” bakers for about ten years. It is a delight to open the door of these rather unprepossessing looking premises, to see Betty and her assistant in front of racks of brown crusty buns, baps and loaves of all sizes. There are enough cakes, pastries and pies, containing enough sugar, cream and meat to make a cardiac surgeon shudder! Everything is made on the premises. The dough is not imported chilled from some factory miles away. It’s made daily. This task, I understand, is the last one to be completed before the bakers leave each afternoon. The coal ovens are fired up at 5:30 a.m. six days a week, and by 9 0’ clock the first customer is being served. The first batch is usually sold out by half-past ten at which time the customers’ enquiries are greeted with the response, “ thirty minutes for buns luv”. And there’s no charge for the smell of freshly baked bread…wonderful Cheers t

posted by Tony @ Thursday, October 28, 2004