Lily the BreadhoundMay 20th, 2010 12:15pm Rebecca
My history with Breadworks began in the months before it opened. I was taking my new puppy, Lily, for a walk at a nearby middle school very early one morning and I met a man with his two dogs. We started talking as our dogs played and I discovered that this was Larry Domnitz, our neighbor from across the street and the owner of the bakery Breadworks that was to open the following month just down the street from where we lived. This was welcome news since back when Breadworks opened there was no other place in Boulder to get good bread. (This is still true in my opinion.) Anyhow, Larry, my husband Ivan, and I became very close friends and our dogs continued to walk and play together. Lily was our first dog and Ivan and I doted on her. She was a Flat-Coated Retriever and therefore, being a retriever, would and did eat anything, from the doggy delicious to unsavory unmentionables. However, one day she came down with an illness and developed a very high fever (105). I knew she was ill because she would eat nothing; neither her own food nor the hamburger or chicken I had bought interested her. I took her to see her doctor who believed that she had a virus and told me to monitor her temperature and to make sure Lily ate, telling me to offer her anything at all to get some nourishment into her. I was frantic with worry and when Lily remained apathetic at the smell and sight of high grade beef, I grew truly scared. Lily had always loved all the Breadworks breads. So, although I thought it was useless, I offered Lily a hunk of a Breadworks baguette. I was amazed and thrilled when Lily took the bread from my hand and ate it. I offered her more bread and she ate more. That evening when I saw Larry in our neighborhood, I told him that Lily, while she still refusing hamburger and chicken finally had eaten something and that something was Breadworks bread. That evening on his way home from work, our good friend Larry stopped by our house to deliver a pain au levain just for Lily’s delectation. I fed her almost the whole loaf and she happily ate it all. Lily did get better and lived many more years, but she never stopped loving Breadworks bread and had many a baguette and other kinds of their bread in the years that followed. Rebecca is a clinical and forensic psychiatrist who lives in Boulder, Colorado with her husband and two dogs. When she is not working, she is spending time playing with (and training) her two dogs and their best friends, the “Breadworks dogs”.Posted in: NoneShare: Twitter, FacebookOlio Bello! (Or the story of how a not-so-nice Jewish boy from West Colfax got into the olive oil business...)May 11th, 2010 2:06pm Jack
Olive oil is one of the oldest commodities known to man. The "discovery" of olive oil is lost in the mists of time. Olive oil amphorae have been recovered from ships that date from thousands of years ago. It appears that the olive tree and olive oil were first utilized in the Mediterranean area, and that explains why it came naturally to a Jewish boy, notwithstanding the fact that the only oil he remembers his own mother using is melted schmaltz. Today, however, Israel is a major producer of olive oil and has developed its own varietal, the Barnea. Olive oil is still the major oil in the Mediterranean diet, and truly fine "extra virgin" olive oil is highly prized amongst connoisseurs, as it is produced only in limited quantities (even if every label in the grocery store reads extra virgin). The name extra virgin is a bit misleading, somewhat like being only partly pregnant. Be that as it may, prior to every Luigi, Zorba, and Ramon getting involved in the marketing of olive oil to an ignorant and trusting population, the term extra virgin was indeed a standard of a very fine olive oil. This standard was based upon chemistry and a sophisticated palate. Jack is a retired home builder from Denver, CO. More recently, he started, developed, and sold an olive oil company with his wife, Sue.Posted in: NoneShare: Twitter, Facebook |
