Introducing DAYBAKER

An ever-evolving collection of recipes, archival materials, stories and musings centered around bread.

Hi I’m Chad Robertson, co- founder of Tartine, observed bread obsessive, handy with grains and cast iron, and forever working to learn from others. Thankfully my style has continued to evolve circumstantially over the years, but my curiosity for cooking and baking has only grown stronger. Here at DAYBAKER, you’ll find an ever-evolving collection of recipes, archival materials, stories and musings centered around bread and its companions.

DAYBAKER is a return to source - to the meditative practice of working with my hands daily to realize an imagined vision: the path from kernel of an idea to a thing.

What you can expect:

By making and writing weekly, whether it’s a loaf of bread, a meal built on toast, a memory, person, or place that altered my course along the way, we will go deep. Drawing inspiration from old and new, people and places, travels and relationships - the stories we write and tell here visually will bring you along in the process. 

To be sure, there will be ample recipes here – mostly new directions I’m working on now. But also my favorites from over the years which inform all that follows – working  through decades of learning, trials and errors to bring many of these classics up to the now. Here I endeavor to convey much more context in the origin stories of these recipes and the extraordinary characters who inspired pivotal shifts along the way, bringing the rich history of these collaborations to you.

For starters, I’m (sort of) limiting myself to three different directions here. My initial thinking is that most posts will not the be the one and done style, but rather multi part installments, with some overlap and a couple of different narratives going at the same time. 

The three starters are: 

1. Exploration and origin of the idea of ‘country bread’- starting with the Eastern and Western European tradition and then going backwards, forwards, and sideways to see how the influence and evolution of this idea has unfolded since the early to mid 20th century, and accelerated from the 1980s landing in the US and literally fully circling the globe throughout the early internet information era illuminated with perspectives from several of my baking friends across both hemispheres.

2. Celebration and study of the ‘health breads’ of my childhood. Lots of us know and love these breads mostly found in the freezer section of natural foods stores. Ezekiel, Essene, etc - these breads were early outliers, many of them inspiration for directions and ideas I’ve explored over the years. It’s time to go deeper with these - to detail the origins and context of their entry into the American health food movement of the 70s and 80s. There will be recipes studies and some fun collaborations.

3. Snacks for dinner: or more accurately things on toast. There are lots of stories and recipes from the past to aggregate here, and also infinite new ones.. This series I’m really looking forward to as it will be an ongoing collaboration also with chefs and bakers around the world with dishes based on specific regional breads and highlighting seasonal, culturally significant ingredients like late summer produce from Santa Monica, Mexico City, or Stockholm. There will be pop ups and breaking bread along the way. 

As this is a new endeavor, we will be learning together. So, please let me know as we go which posts you love and what you want to see more of. My goal is to be an open book to this community so we can grow together.

All the best, 

Chad Robertson

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