Hello, this is Dave I'm your host and cookies is coming to you. From the heart of Manhattan the Rockefeller Center joined as usual witness dasya the hammer Lopez How you doing? Good. Yeah. Yeah. Got got John behind me from you know used to be Booker and DAX now just executive chef at the Temperance wine bar. How're you doing, John? Doing great. Thanks. Yeah, yeah, we got. We got Joe Hasan rockin the panels. I welcome. Yeah, yeah. Do we have jacket in your jacket for the shows? Jack? No. Flying flying? No. Okay. Where's he flying from to? To do sell it?

Yeah, sorry to be into it.

Yeah. La to DC. All right. You know, we call that flight. Wow. No offense, DC. No offense. I kinda love you. Maybe. I don't know. I will eat DC. But we do have from Vancouver Island Quinn, how you doing? Hey, I'm good. Yeah, great. And then in the, in the whatever in our new style of thing where we before we go off on a bunch of tangents, we introduced a special guest. I'm very happy to have Craig Hutchinson here from OMO OMO restaurants soon to be OMO bagels, bagels in New Haven, how you doing?

Attitude is mindset. I'm wonderful. Well,

so the reason I want to have you on we're gonna go on tangents in a minute. But the reason I want to have you on as I was invited, I don't know why. But I was invited as a guest judge for Bagel fest, I don't know, like a month or two ago in Brooklyn. And I had your bagel. And I was like, Oh, this is a great bagel. And then I was like, and unlike me, 80 85% of the people, they're like you were super stoked to talk about like technique and ingredients. And so we went, you're using a lot of ingredients, I think are super interesting to doodle, and stuff. So that's why I have you on but before that, let's go through random tangents. So if you're listening, live on Patreon, call in your questions too. Especially bagel related, especially bagel related 917-410-1507. That's 917-410-1507. And if you can't listen live, because you aren't on the Patreon, John, what should they do?

Well, you can download the podcast anywhere, but you should also become a cooking issues Patreon member go to patreon.com/cooking issues and sign up as a bunch of different membership levels. And you get awesome perks and all the levels. So yeah, just kind of books or kitchen Arts and Letters, access to the discord and many, many other things.

Now, one thing that's an issue, right, here's an issue that I hadn't thought about. So we do the episode on on a Tuesday. And the Patreon folks can listen to it right. Now. What early before everyone else? Yeah, alive and early. And then on Friday, we let you know anyone can download for free. That's our that's our mode. Right? It's true, right? Because you know, information should be free eventually. You don't essentially eventually free. It's my opinion. But anyway, you can have your own opinion. That's my opinion. Now, next Tuesday is the last time to ask a question before Thanksgiving, correct. That's true, but you can't listen to the answer. until it's too late. If you're not on the Patreon, it's good hook. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So on Friday, after you've already ruined your meal, you can figure out what you should have done on the Thursday. Or you could join the Patreon and get the answer right away and I'll make a promise next week isn't no tangent Tuesday, theoretically, I promise that like I will go on no tangents until all the Thanksgiving questions are answered. Wow.

Other stuff I feel like all the Thanksgiving questions have been asked over the past like 11 years and that people don't have any more Thanksgiving questions. That's not true.

No, who should have been a guest on next year is somebody from the butterball wine,

butterball? Oh, the butterball telephone. Yeah. Well, I'm, that's, you know, have you ever called that place? Craig? I never have we should all just call it and just make up problems. Yeah. I left the bag inside the bird.

Can I make my moose out of it now?

Why do you use plastic bags inside of something I'm gonna bake. Actually, I don't know if butter ball is one of the paper bag people or one of the plastic bag people but why isn't everyone a paper bag person? Why stick plastic inside of a bird you're gonna roast?

That about 90% of people do roast anyway. Yeah, I mean, I've I even forget it still. Yeah,

it well. Yeah. Especially if you're not doing the old school stuffing things. Speaking of old school stuffing. Today, last week or week and a half ago I taped an episode of Dave Chang and christenings recipe club. The Thanksgiving episode. And I think it's go it's it's gone up today already, John? Yeah, yes, you could find that. You can find that on Spotify in this anywhere. Anywhere, not just on Spotify.

No, I just found it on the iTunes podcast. So yeah, Spotify put

anywhere anywhere you can find it. But I'll say this here's what I talked about. So apparently recipe club while he did it is where you're supposed to use somebody else's recipe and then you make it and then you make comments on it. Right? But for for the Thanksgiving episode, Chang was like, What are two recipes that that I use? So I cooked my own recipes, which is kind of unfair. So I messed with them a little bit. So I did my mom's stuffing. Look, you know, I've had for the past 50 years, you know what I mean? And I can make it in my sleep. In fact, if I go to somebody else's house for Thanksgiving, when I come home, I make that you don't I mean, because no one else is stuffing is what I want, right stuff that you want your stuffing that you want. It's not whether it's best or worst you so you want the one you want. Yeah,

yeah. You're telling me you've never been satisfied with somebody else's stuff. No. Other stuffing tastes good. But I haven't had Thanksgiving or should I say no stuffing has satisfied you. That's right.

Right. Right. But, but I will say and I and my mother in law's Parker house rolls, which I've modified because so Parker house rule for those of you that don't know, haven't had a Parker house roll, like a lot of butter answers a lot of butter. And she forms hers with where you fold. She makes the little round ones and then paint it with butter and then fold it into a C and then stack them. So I modified because I'm so lazy. I'm not going to do that. So I just make one giant flat log and cut them into like folded squares because I'm lazy.

Yeah. It's also kind of Hawaiian roll esque. Yes. isn't bad.

No, it's just massive amounts of butter. If you want to know why it's good. You make like, what's funny is is that it's kinda like brioche but like low on mine anyway, low on egg and high on milk. And it's

kind of like brioche until you get to the shaping component of it, then you realize this is awful.

You don't make progress. Yeah, well, that's why you just wrote instead of doing the each individual thing, just like divide your dough into however many lines of rolls you're going to do. Roll it real long, painted, long folded over and go quack, quack, quack, write it, and then you're done. They're going to share steam anyway. So right, and, and no one's like, these aren't semi circles. They're rising anyway. You know what I mean? They're rising, and they're gonna bump into each other anyhow, who needs the little semi circular thing? Also, I butter not not just in the dough, not just on the bottom of the pan. And inside them, not just afterwards, but also before on top. Wow, butter in the dough on the bottom, in the middle on the top. Two times,

split them open more butter at the table. Oh, yeah. Well, so that's

funny, right. So like my niece, Wiley's daughter, Wiley, Miley's daughter comes in. And I'm serving her these Parker house rolls because I made like, 24 of them for the episode, right? And she's like, can I have butter? And I'm like, absolutely. I just want you to know that it's already about half butter by weight. She's like, I didn't ask you how much butter was in it. I asked for more butter now. And I was like, that's fair. That's fair. Yeah. Anyways, so Chang said and you should go watch that. It's the best of me stuffing he's ever had. And he wants to make my mom's stuffing the most most popular stuffing. And it's simple to make. And it's very 1970s because my mom came up with the recipe in the early 1970s as an agglomeration actually of my dad's mom's stuffing because my my other grandma's stuff. Oh, good. And she's dead though. She's dead. She's dead. They're all dead. I can say whatever I like they're all dead. You know? You can speak ill of the dead stuffing on my right John. Sure. Okay. And he says that it's simple uses only ingredients you can source in the 1970s

which means that everything is out of account

that well I mean, you have to sauteed mushrooms my mom didn't use canned mushrooms. My mom was progressive 70s person you know what I mean? So like,

so no, no cream of mushroom soup? No, that was a staple of my grandma. Yeah, creamy mushroom soup made its way into everything.

I tell you the secret in my the secret in my in my mom's stuffing two secrets three secrets one poultry seasoning right 70 style poultry seasoning right to lots of pork sausage that kind of come in a tube you know that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Jones we use Jones but you could use Jimmy Dean or or West Park so you could use any of those as long as they are at a different aim on CG two tube of meat like a lot of that. One more secret. Not dried bread, fresh bread but semi dense white bread, Pepperidge Farm style and the kicker canned mandarin oranges.

So something that can soak up a ton of fat

which is also in that like there's a lot of butter and add to oh yeah butter

and when you make it does it almost come out like Detroit style pizza on the outside like super crispy all the way around?

Depends how you cook it so like, typically like the stuff that's in the bird just absorbs bird juice and comes out like a like a bird bread pudding like like like a turkey bread pudding. And then we used to throw it in a casserole with the with the aluminum on the top so that it would it would it would steam itself first and then we rip off the aluminum and crust the top off of it. Okay, and yeah, it gets that crispy, crunchy stuff on top and then like, you know, bread pudding underneath that Here's

the question do you prefer the stuff that was cooked in the bird or the stuff that was cooked more like a dressing?

Okay, the taste and stuff in the bird is inherently superior however the texture of the stuff is cooked casserole style a little bit better. So

you have a texture or flavor person's question. I have to choose in this one.

I think the ultimate would be to make some stock in with the casserole style want to bake it. But have you tried that? Yeah. Chang did.

I did I cook moment on stock and it really you have to modify it as it cooks. So the bread, the starch, the fats, and the stock all make that bread pudding style that you were just talking about?

I always I always bone out my birds before I cook them because because you know how to cook. Right? Right. So I bone out the birds and I have a crap ton of turkey stock every Thanksgiving, right? And so I usually make like a lot of gravy. And so like I don't worry about because so even in the casserole one I'm going to dump like real strong turkey gravy on it. So that's how I buy I should just put some stock into the stunning,

but don't change it because it's already superior to everybody else's. Well

according to Dave, I don't make these kinds of claims

he does. He did already switch it.

He didn't he couldn't find poultry seasoning. So for some reason he chose Saison. Sage and he's in California. I don't know. Of course, that's where my mom invented anyway, so like he did like, like sage and, and chicken chicken stock paste. It was gonna say like a bouillon cube, yeah, probably a cube, I have the calculation somewhere. Is is you're putting in like a lot of salt. Just be aware to down your salt because I sold all my ingredients as my mom does as I'm cooking. So when I sweat the onions and celery, they get salted. Everything gets salted, to the way that that thing tastes good. And then we did all those together. It only needs a little bit of correction.

Can I interject for one quick minute. Of course, it turns out that one of our listeners mothers is a supervisor at the butterball Turkey outline.

Oh, my God, because you just have to say it out loud and dreams come true. Oh my god. So great. Oh, my God, I want to it's too late to have them on this year.

So is she the kind of person that when you ask, can I please speak to a supervisor? You get transferred over to her?

I guess? I don't know. We'll see what he comments. But that's you have to come up with

a massive problem. And then try to get into Yeah, so

the question, right, the question is, right, and it is what you're hitting at Craig is, is, is there some sort of like super low level call center person who's going to take the calls never actually cooked a turkey before? Right. They're like, have you rebooted the turkey?

You don't I mean, unplug and replug back, right.

Did you unplug the turkey for 30 seconds and plug it back in? And I Oh, wait, wait. Oh turkey. You don't I mean, like something that Or is everyone a train cooker picks up the phone?

In which case, maybe you need to come on with such a high level question that you need to weed out your entry level.

Yeah. Yeah. Or like, you know, and I think it's more interesting to come up with real questions rather than like, Hey, I'm on fire. I'm on fire. You know, like all the safety department. One more? Yeah, hang up, call 911 You

could also be ridiculous and say I'm having problems executing my mother's stuffing. Could you please help me? Something that nobody can help you with?

Or stones? We could call them with bionic Turkey questions shows? Right? I think everyone's thinking that. Well, no, only three people know about it. So how can everyone be sick of it? Those three people are sick of it. Very they're very vocal to people that butterball won't know it. Well Anastasia is sick of anything related to cooking my rice does not Yeah, so speaking of before we get into bagel questions anyone cook anything or have any interesting culinary things happened to them in the past week. Oh, I got some good stuff from Edwards aged meats. We Oh. Ah, I got beef cracker got aged pork belly. I haven't had before. Bacon. Well, I mean, like a dry. Dry in some ribeye. Some, you know some? Yeah, some

pork is very cheesy.

Yeah, that's what I always find. I'll let you know when I asked.

He's ferment a lot of sausage and stick. It's very cheesy,

even the likes to ferment their ribs is is Andy Rickard. He used to do like fermented Thai ribs.

It's quite popular in a Asian cuisine to ferment your pork before you get into the next infusion step of like, you know, sausage making or whatever it is.

Yeah, back in the day, he was having real issues figuring out how he was going to do that and not run afoul of DL H problems. You know, I mean,

hide them hide in the office.

Yeah. I mean, for everyone wondering it's Edwards age to beanstalk calm and I think his social media handle is the same stuff. It's great.

Yeah, you guys gotta keep separate Edwards age meats from Sam Edwards country ham. They are two different people on two different sides. sort of the United States, right? One aged ham for several 100 years they've been making it right. In the in the, what's it called the serie Surry, Virginia? What's that called? Tidewater area of Virginia? Right. And the other one, Where's, where's the interstates? They're in California, right?

Yes. That's a clear I believe.

I've never been. Yeah. Yeah, stars. You've been there, right? No, really? Okay. All right. Well, if no one has any,

we were unveiling our Bob co program. So we've just concluded over a month and a half of arduous Bob cook baking. So that was that was interesting. We broke bread this morning. And it was a we got it. So happy.

What's your Bob? Good target? I'm not saying there's a best worse. What's your target for Bob? Like? Did you grow up eating vodka?

No. Okay, I didn't grow up with. I grew up with a heavy Jewish community. But like, our definition of bagels was very Dunkin Donuts at least. And that's okay. Because it's got to start somewhere. Okay, and pass that No, not a lot of brigalow hamentashen are all the really good stuff that we now become obsessed with. But for bbka It's got to have the polpark quality of a monkey bread. Okay, has to have the flakiness of a croissant in some way without laminating because we don't laminate. Not too much chocolate, high quality level of chocolate so that you're relying more on your techniques so that when you think about the cinnamon bbka That's where you really are impressing people.

And so where everybody starts with a chocolate book, right? Where are you on the dryness scale?

Not not, that was our biggest problem. Okay, yeah. So

I think some people actually get like a slightly dry Baabda Well, I'm not saying that they're right or wrong.

That's chocolate bread. That's that's the a lot of the conversation that we're having is how bready versus how bumpy are we right now which Bob to E. We hope that will be approved as a word someday because we use it quite often instead

of Bob Goliath. Rebekah similar Rocky, but Yeah, Bob, Bob, Bob. Bob. Sounds like bubkis though,

might not you know, my style. I like throwing away a lot of the rules and just going for what it is that we that we believe is a good quality product.

Well, that's certainly true. So let's get into this style and why why I had you first

of all, you brought bagels, we have break bagels in front of us. Alright, so

you should pull out one of these bagels because John, you've never had these before right now. And stars you've never had Joey never don't

eat out of the ones that are in front of you. All right, of this one. Because the crust is still the integrity of the outside is still there. So you're passing them around, you know, I washed my hands at least. So you remember, remember these though, right? They were they're not as quite high on the height level as a lot of the other bagels that you had, the darkness of them is way different. And also like our entire process is completely different. You see all the

bubbles so you look at you look at one of these bagels and I'll visualize this for you if you can't see it is that they? They are they have it's like you know how I'm like modern cars, they're glossy and matte at the same time. Like you know how like you see those beamers with that like kind of semi shiny that semi shiny coat. It's like one it's one of those and there's like also looked at blistering on that sucker right so that's non traditional for you know, most New York bagels to see kind of a blister level like that. So first of all the minute you look at it, you're like oh, that's a different right? Yeah. And then you rip it and the crust, right? Has that awesome kind of chewiness it's got a good thickness it's got leather and crisp but the inside oh by the way I brought God's cream cheese Russ and daughters you've had roasted or fried cheese

of course yeah. We ate a lot of Russ and daughters when we were looking into being a bagel shop Yeah, what

do you what do you do?

Are you under knife?

Are you on Philly for cream? Or do you do have some like sort of fan we

have we fabricate up a Philly but we are always in the market for adaptation and evolution. So we worked on our bagel for the past three years and eventually a target will go on to our cream cheeses back and we will completely rip open whatever program we're doing right now and reinvent it.

Yeah, cuz I because at Russ and daughters, all of their flavor cream cheeses are Philly. And the plain one is they won't tell you. They won't tell you but we will

we do we even the plain one. We fabricate them. So it's similar to what they do. Like it's it you can't ever have a consumer think that they're getting something that they can get to a grocery store. You always have to be elevating it in some way, shape or form. Yeah, I've already into OMO bagels this morning so so

they are all you guys the so what's awesome about is it that texture on the inside. Like it's still substantial, but it's not at all Sweet. Okay, so you know how, like modern bagels, their their Jack was so much more maybe sugar, right? That it's they can almost get stick to your teeth gummy. So gummy. And there's none of that in this, like none of

it such a light amount of malt that goes into it, we use the outside to get a little bit of malt flavor on as well. But again, it's you're so diluted because we use time as more of our control than we do by additive ingredients,

right? So if you look at the inside of the bagel also, it's clearly not made with white flour. Right. And so that's what kind of struck me and then when I started talking to you more, because again, I think you're, you put so much work into the bagel itself, that you have no problem telling everybody. It's not like there's some sort of magic flip switch, you can flip and all of a sudden make this bagel you have to put the work in I guess your theory, I don't know you told me is that no one's going to do that. So I'll just tell you everything I do.

I told you everything I do now that you have me on a little bit bigger of a platform. I may keep a couple of things to myself, but I will open up as much as I possibly can about this process because it's quite cool. Right? So

the first thing is first is that you're using a kind of flower that I want everybody in the country to use and I don't know what you call I call it high extraction flour. I don't know what Yeah, high

extraction or bolted is what usually like a small mill, we'll call it but very similar process. Yeah, so

you want to talk about this flour?

Yeah, so we use a ground up as our mill that's based out of Holyoke, Massachusetts, they source from three different farms two out of New York and one out of Maine. The one from Maine is like, it might as well be Canada. It's like right on the New Brunswick border. But it's a hard red winter wheat. We are. We're scheduling a visit up to the actual mill to determine if it is a warthog or not. But from my past bacon experiences, I believe we are using a warthog grain. But coming from three different farms, it could just be a little bit of a blend. There is some spring red winter wheat in there are some red spring wheat in there as well. The difference between those two is just kind of like the the timing of how long it takes for the grain to be harvested and how much you could call it flavor is developed. Right? Well, you know, little bit different directions. Your answer

everyone who knows? milling wheat? Right knows not not modern milling, not roller milling. Right? That winter, we taste better than spring wheat.

Yeah, I hope that we're always using, you know, winter wheat, but

as the majority as a majority Yeah, spring we Yeah, it's spring. It's gonna add like more structure more but like, more dogs are delicious. Sweet. I've milled? I don't know, only not like, you know, I've only moved like 5060 pounds of it by like warthog a lot. You know what I mean? And the high extraction flat what people don't winter wheat. Right, was the standard wheat both soft and hard winter wheat was the standard wheat in the United States, up until the 1870s. And the reason is, is that we didn't have the technology to get all of the brand off. Right. First of all, it's the spring wheat is a lot harder, it has higher gluten, they could not make decent what we're calling Bolton flour just been sifted, right. And they couldn't get as good a tasting flour out of spring wheat before they invented. Before they invented the these blowers that would blow the brand off. And they could do it in two parts. And they could separate the brand more effectively. So it actually happened before the advent of the roller mill. So that's called patent. The original patent flour was a patent on these machines that allow them to effectively separate the brand and then allow them to mill good flour from spring wheat, but when it's whole wheat, spring wheat typically doesn't taste as good as winter so you want majority winter wheat in your blends if you're going to go anywhere close to whole wheat. And any of you have ever had whole wheat flour and been like used it and said This sucks. Let's because you're using roller mill whole wheat flour, you're not and it's whole wheat. This is bolted so it's like what's your extraction on this? 82 So 82% of the wheat kernel makes it into this bagel 82% Right. And what doesn't make it in sure is mostly Bran right but there's a lot of German this right? A lot of the flavor and none of the harshness and bitterness like not one not expect anyone who's cooked with this will bake with high extraction flour I can tell you it is freaking Joy right or wrong. It's a joy. flavor wise depends

on where you're at in the process. It's also a throw away your Recipe Book kind of experience. But yes, once you learn to harness it, it is you really can't look back,

right because it just the taste is so good. And so like the thing is, is that like yo the bagel I guess it's not as much of a thing but like in breads like in hearth breads, you're not going to get as much of the You're not going to get that like, no need interior without a lot of like finagle and you're not gonna get those giant airy holes, you're not gonna get it. But like, side by side, the taste of it is so addictive that taste of

this, like you're eating real bread, like what, what it should be. And there's also such a big problem with commercially milled whole wheat, because of how fast they're milling that they're actually heating up the brand on the outside, which that is then basically turning bad inside of these bags of flour that reinstalled on on the shelves. So you're just not getting the true flavor, the clean flavor of the flower.

Also I've tried to I'm trying to figure out a way to like commercial whole wheat, I really have from the book I'm writing and in their in their bread, whole wheat things they're always doping it with like I think a lot of spring to try to get that wheat to try to get that gluten level back up, because it's going to get lowered by the fact that they add all the brand. So right away, that's a mistake, I think for flavor. And then they're also I think rebuilding the brand. So if you've ever made flour, and if you've ever made flour, and not sifted it, the brand particles are a lot bigger than they are in whole wheat flour for that. So like,

is that so that they're they're making it so that the home cook doesn't have to adjust their hydration levels? I think so or like it LeBron is actually absorbing some of the water or something? Well,

I think what it is, is they don't want the flour to feel that different. Or they I think they think that like they're gonna deflate it more if they have, like, bigger brand pieces. But I think that that rebuilding the brand, so fine. I think that's why it's so bitter. And plus, it's old, right? It's so old. But even if it wasn't old, I think it's just, it's, I think it's just the tiny, tiny brand. And

there's nothing better than seeing the melody on the bag of flour that I was introduced to that when I first started baking, I was like, oh, is seeing that seeing that number is quite important right now.

So people out there who are professional bakers, but who haven't gotten into this kind of relatively new again, like this 1860s world of what flour should be right? Bear in mind that yes, I'm aware that white flour gets better as it ages, which is why you oxidize it, you bleach it. And not this not true with the high high extraction flowers. I'm sure there is some baking potential that gets better over time, but they don't. I've tested by the way on on high fraction flower from zero to three months. And it was fairly stable over that three months. I haven't done a year or anything like that. But so don't don't think of aging white flower the same way you think of the high fresh flowers. So my first question to you before I get to the questions other people have is, what's it like? Like? How much more does it cost to buy this kind of flower? As opposed to because I make it at home? I don't have to consume it as a it's an input price. And how much of the bagels cost?

Not really. It's it's more like three times, but yeah, well, it's a slightly different hydration level. So you're cutting it with a little bit more water.

I've never had obviously never had a bagel business. How much of a bagel is labor and how much is cost of goods,

we switched over to a bagel machine in 2000, late 2020 as a Christmas gift to ourselves for making it through the pandemic and not having to fold the restaurant. So we've managed to keep labor low because of that. So we invest mostly in our product and our infrastructure.

Right? In other words, like in theory, spending three times as much on my flour equals what to a consumer, if you're going to actually just pass it up the chain to them like,

oh, I mean, figure this in a restaurant every single time you pay 30 cents. For the restaurant owner, you're always paying $1 as the consumer, right? Just plain and simple. So if I'm saying that your King Arthur Flour that you're buying in the grocery store is I don't know, I haven't bought one in a while and it's just steal from the restaurant. But like, let's say a bag is 10 bucks, and I'm telling you that it's doubled to triple. Right? You know, it just imagine going to the grocery store and paying $30 for your flour. It's pretty crazy,

right? But the good news is right in the eye. No, it's your primary input probably for the bagel, I'm sure. I'm sure fish and cream cheeses is fantastically more expensive, but like it's your primary input for the bagel. Even though it is three times as much. It's kind of like razors, even though a Gillette Mach three or whatever they are Mach 3005 Whatever they are now, even though they're like 20 times what a normal razor cost. They're still affordable to people, right?

So we're I mean, we're at $2 a bagel right now in the shop. And at that Bagel fest that we met, There were shops that were selling their bagels for 225. I'm much more proud of our product than I was with tasting. Some of the other things that was there because you can tell as you and I talked about, you know instantly when somebody's using a bleach permitted flower. There was even a comment from one of the booths right next to me, after they were asking about our grains So they're saying, Oh, well, I can't even because I'm in New York, I can't afford to do that. So maybe in a small Mart sure they can they need to charge for it. But maybe in a small market, and having my business not cost as much to be in a small market is very helpful for me. Yeah. So.

But on the other hand, you're doing in New Haven. Again, I lived in New Haven for years. And you don't have the necessarily built in market of bagel freaks that you would have here. So there's two sides of that coin. No,

we opened up with a very New Yorky menu. And it just didn't fly at first, you know. And so we really needed to keep our ears open in order to stay above water through the pandemic to say, like, Oh, this is what you want. Okay, let's give that a shot. And so we kept evolving the menu. And we continue to do that, as we're mainly student based being right off of Yale's campus, which helps us a lot. And so each class brings a different desire for menu choices. And so we're always looking at our model saying like, how do we how do we improve according to the taste buds of today?

So you told me it was funny at the bagel fed, she told me that, you know, they didn't sell to anyone. Along the 95 corridor, the basically all the flour went directly from where it was milled, like down the corridor to New York, and like nothing in between you were like, you just have to like, look off the highway. And I'm right there. You know what I mean? Yeah,

yeah. Because we were working with, you know, shout out to Myers produce, who is the one who does who coordinates all the deliveries with ground up? And so I was talking with Andy Meyers, when I first opened up and I just said, you know, hey, there a way that I could get that Brooklyn product that you were giving me? That's all from New York, New England? Can I get that in New England? And she's like, I don't know. You know, we're very much based. I was like, No, and I literally sent her over a map image of like, this is how far off the highway we are,

there's a literal, for the bakery, almost like, you know, on the street, right. They're great.

They they deliver, we have to preorder about a month in advance for our milling. And that has, that was a hard adjustment in the beginning, because normally, you can just get all your flour tomorrow.

And also probably makes it almost like, like a liquor inventory is that you actually have money in inventory in a way you wouldn't necessarily have.

Yeah, fortunately, we haven't gone into the world of futures yet where I'm buying crops worth of stuff. But who knows, maybe someday

I will. So does it make you nervous? And like I'm always wonder about the scalability of this because I was trying to convince Chang on this menu thing I was telling you about was like, having made the Parker house rolls with high extraction flour. He's like, Where can where can I tell people to buy high extraction flour? I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. No, you can

get it, I think ground up. You know, you would be better at pulling up their website, but I believe you can just order direct from them. So they sell to a human, they call it their bread flour. And it's 82% Higher extraction, it's 13.6% protein, which is about 1.4% lower than what's on the shelves. So you are going to need to adapt for that.

Well, you and I also know that the protein numbers on anything with whole weeds alive because because the brand has such a higher protein level. And if it's not gluten, which is why they

want you want the other part, but at the same Yeah, so like 13.6 is a high number for a high extraction on the protein. But Rob don't get 100% yield

11 and change, right? Yeah, in

the 10 range. Because we've tried side by side with testing out right, bagels and whatnot. I mean, Rye is like, you know, dry comes in at 10% protein, and it's as if you're just using absolutely nothing. There's no spring and rye bread.

I cannot wrap my head around rye bacon. I haven't tried too much. I have a lot of dry,

leave it underneath your bacon table and revisited when it looks like a puddle of not bread and then bake that and that's rye bread.

Yeah, I know. Like I have a bunch of dry Anyway, whatever. I love the taste of rye but like, I don't know, I haven't invested the time to read.

We only do ride when we're doing ride. A ride makes its way into our pasta program. And that's about it.

Yeah. Okay, so that's the flat but but so do you get nervous? How would you expand like, is there? Is there a way for more people in the country to get this kind of flower? Or not? Like, is this something that can grow? Oh my not?

What a what a hard assessment on US agriculture we're about to make right now. The system is completely broken. I'll just start there. Yes, you can. But you're going to need to really seek out to find more distribution outlets like Meyers produce, like we do. Like they're not the biggest, easiest thing to find. So like, you know, local doesn't always mean better. I do believe that. But at the same time, the quality of ingredients do and so it finding the distribution is just the hardest part. Then then you're talking about the cost. Then you're talking about the labor and the thought process and intellect that goes into making something like that. It's it's an uphill battle. But I think it starts with serving your bagels like this and spreading the word about it.

Yeah, because also distributions of paints. So if you were willing to pay 10 times as much, right, you can get Anson mills. They make good quality products, but then you have to buy it from them. They ship once a week. And then there's this whole kind of Megilla your minimums and whatnot. And it's hard to just walk into a place and buy this stuff. You know, at what point

if we all jump on board with all this? Are we now starting to push the system of what these farms stand for? And at what point did they start putting nitrogen into their ground in order to be able to keep up with volume or not? At the same? We're just we're not mill it and speed it up. So like, you know, this, it's a hard topic.

Yeah, well, look, I mean, there's a place for roller milled white flour, it makes great products, if that's what you're looking for. It's just I happen to fall in love with this particular type of flour. Me too.

Or really wish for the bottom line. I didn't, but

it is what it is. So then, okay, so that's the first thing you do this not standard. And by the way, I haven't tasted every bagel on Earth. But I've never tasted someone who uses flour in a bagel in a bagel business. Who would their job is to make bagels for people not just as a one off or something like this, who's not also their own Miller, which is interesting, right? Because there are people whose model is I'm gonna do my own million we had Adam Leon Theon, you know, and he's like, you know, I'm doing my own milling. Not a bagel guy. But me. I'm sure he's made bagels. But that's not his thing. But it's like to have someone saying, I'm going to make the commitment to buy this kind of mill flour to make a bagel. That was the first thing I was like, Okay, I need to have you on the show. Second, right. How long is this bagel fermenting? 48 hours, 48 hours? And what's new? So

you told me that that was bizarre? And I look, actually the one that I fed? You was 72. Yeah. Yeah, we threw away our recipe books to be able to create that I'd still I'd actually love to hear from you is, again is to I kinda don't understand how people haven't been able to achieve that. You told me that. Some people have tried doing it and they don't they don't get a product out of it or something.

Well, you're not just okay. So like, take take pizza, right? Where people are doing like, long, long. ferments, right. And they're doing a ferment. They're doing their what they call on the proof, right, but it's not a shaped me and shaved, but it's, then they're, they're shaping it right before they make it. Right. Right. You know, you're actually shaping like you're doing and you're doing an overnight, you're not It's not wait time again, you don't do an overnight bulk. You do an overnight bulk note

No, overnight, we'll go straight from you. Because we don't allow for air to start. So under you under hydrate the dough, right? Well, that's the key, you have to under hydrate and not activate your yeast,

right, the key is right on a long ferment. So bagels are relatively low, relatively low,

hydrophilic, 50, you know, 50 to 55%. Sure.

So on a low hydration, right, like, or for any given hydration on a long proof, especially on this kind of a flower, it's gonna go more slack on you as you go. And you're not going to have, so you have to make it even stiffer. At the beginning, especially when, because the whole week component is so thirsty, right?

One, it's thirsty to like, I think it's such a, the first time that somebody ever called a walk in or a refrigerator, a humid environment. Like I just I wanted to argue with them instantly, it just it did not make sense whatsoever. And then you actually start to practice like that. And you realize that like, I don't even know, because I'm not a scientist, I can't break it down. But like, I got to imagine that when we bake this, we're somewhere in the 60s, close to 70% on our hydration just because of how much it's soaked up in refrigeration. Right, because it's wrapped up in on trays already shaped. And just inside of that is that that human environment is just the you know, the flower is just soaking it all up.

Well, and also like, I mean, the brand is going to be the brand, right but then the damage starch is some of its going to get converted to sugar from the from the enzymes and then that's that's going to release more water. And in 2448 our environment, more of that's going to take place and would take place in a couple of our fermentation

The challenge is that water equals activity and Brett. So if you're creating all this activity, you're gonna get an overproof product. But as you can see, just from simple Baker's standpoint, the there's no giant hole at the very top of our crust, therefore it's not overproof

right. So second, that's the second non standard thing. So then, okay, I said this. How, how long did you do you boil your bagels and what you told me? We don't boil our bagels. Here that John? I heard him no boil on the bagel.