A short story about our bread and a Norwich Farmers’ customer

This past Saturday at the the Norwich Farmers’ Market we had a customer of a certain age who wanted to talk to us about our sourdough bread. Namely, she wanted to say that  our bread reminded her of the bread that she ate as a little girl in Europe.   It was the kind of bread that was more than just what you would eat when it was bought fresh.   It was the kind of bread that, even after a couple days,  you would cut into pieces and eat in a bowl of milk or add to a broth of onions and other root vegetables to thicken and eat as nourishment and sustenance.  It was the kind of bread that later, many, many years in her life,  that she is gravitated towards and buys from us here at the famers’ market to remind her of her fond childhood memories.  She spoke with us this past Saturday and accusingly said in a joking manner that she had no choice but to buy her bread from us because this is the bread of her childhood.  To me, as a baker, there is absolutely no higher praise that I can hear from  a customer.   Through my baking, that I have made such a deep connection put the biggest smile on my face and in my heart.   To me, it justifies what I do.   I invite you to read a short story by Raymond Carver called A Small Good Thing.  I might have mentioned this before in my blog entries, but to reiterate, it reminds me of the bakery I worked at as a teenager.   I can picture the  Portuguese baker that I worked for telling the couple to eat one of his freshly baked rolls.   It is  a small good thing.