On the Road

For the Asheville Bread Festival

Dear bread pals,

Hello from Virginia, from the back seat of the car. My husband is driving and our friend Bobby is in the front seat. They are talking and I am marveling at the spring greens and sky blues.

Tomorrow I’ll talk at the Asheville Bread Festival. I love this particular bread gaggle — I love them all really—but this one twinkles bright with the season’s energy. I am excited to see bakers I haven’t seen in ages!

I’ll be talking about regional grains with Jen Lapidus of Carolina Ground — if you haven’t checked out her book, SOUTHERN GROUND, please do. It is populated by the people who make up the community use this flour & their excellent recipes.

I am also giving a talk about understanding the American loaf. So I’ve been pouring over my collection of pamphlets and really love the language and images used to convince people to buy Bakers’ Bread. This is how the profession referred to itself as mechanization and factories took off in the early 20th century.

The pictures above are from a pamphlet published in 1911 by International Harvester. Like the bread booklets from that era, it is emphasizing the value of machinery. Interestingly, this pamphlet notes that it took 10 years for farmers to accept Cyrus McCormick’s reaper in the mid-1800s. Change is tough to accept, the text declared 112 years ago. Maybe that isn’t true anymore. Maybe we are addicted to progress, convinced by this and other advertisements.

Well, I’ll report back after the events.

Take care, Amy