Cookies and Milk at Tellico Grains Bakery

I’ve interviewed hundreds of bakers, but this was the first one who—during our visit and without prompting—tucked into some cookies and milk just for the simple pleasure of it. A Zen moment. Ahh…bakery life is good!

story & photos by Bakery Boy

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When the bakers I meet realize that I am truly interested in what they do and that I want to write about them—that I’m not asking for a job or stealing trade secrets or trying to sell them anything—they usually open up to me, show me around, let me take pictures while they work, and share a recipe or two.

After countless encounters with bakers, a recent incident came as a most pleasant surprise. It happened during my interview with Stuart and Anissa Shull at their Tellico Grains Bakery in Tellico Plains, Tennessee (click here to see the full story).

At the moment, Anissa was telling me about their family life, about raising two small daughters in a small bakery in a small town, while she rolled pastry dough and scooped fruit filling and folded turnovers. Jotting in my notebook, I glanced over toward Stuart, who was studiously monitoring the temperature of the bakery’s prized wood-burning brick oven.

Just then Stuart—quietly and without me prompting him for a photo opportunity or whatever—poured himself a glass of milk, grabbed a few chocolate chip cookies off a warm pan, and started having a little snack.

My jaw dropped. My pen froze in place. This was bakery life at its best. Here was a baker, unaware that anyone was watching, enjoying the fruits of his labor—enjoying a Zen moment on the job. Stuart dipped a cookie in the milk and took a bite before noticing that I’d grabbed my camera and zoomed in on him.

He broke into a crumb-flecked grin. Classic!

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Click here to see a separate Bakery Boy Blog post about Tellico Grains Bakery