Trust the Process

 

Everything happens for a reason. For the past few years, when I travel I try to get a cooking class in wherever I go. It's been a great way to learn about local cultures and cuisines as well as sharpen my skills. I have also met a lot of fellow foodies and still keep in touch with many of the chefs who have taught me. I honor their knowledge when I make the dishes I learned from them.

With a weekend free in London, I chose to go for a class at Bread Ahead in Borough Market. Chef Alessandro taught us about making brioche. I discovered he was teaching me about so much more. We learned a kneading technique for developing gluten in brioche. It's a dough enriched with eggs and butter, and initially is very sticky. Often, I would be tempted to add flour to alleviate the stickiness. Chef was very clear - no more flour. He explained "that would be good for you, but it would not be good for the dough". He meant that dough operates on specific ratios of flour, sugar, salt, yeast, water... If you change one ingredient (adding more flour), you change the ratios. It is no longer the same dough.

He was talking about two things:

Psychological Safety - I was so concerned about my bread being perfect that I did not allow for anything to go wrong. I was afraid this would mean I was not a good baker or that my skills were lacking. I didn't have the confidence or trust in myself to just do what I knew how to do. The logic of the ratios was clear and I knew it, but I did not trust myself to handle a stickier dough. Instead, I kept trying to solve a problem that wasn't there. The problem wasn't the dough, it was me.

Trust The Process - Not only did I not trust myself, I did not trust the process. The recipe was good; developed after a lot of trial and error by experienced bakers. It works. If you do not try to shortcut or cut corners. If you just trust the process and follow the instructions you get the result. Chef's method was counterintuitive: we worked the dough for several minutes by hand - directly on the wood surface. I would NEVER have put a sticky dough on a wood board, nor trusted myself that working it would eventually result in a beautiful dough that was not at all sticky. Sheepishly, I trusted the process and did as Chef instructed, stretching the dough and using my scraper to bring it back. A few minutes later, the result was a beautiful dough which became a beautiful loaf - the best brioche I have ever made.

It was a great day. A day that was meant to be. A day that gave me some lessons I had forgotten, that I will use both inside and outside of the kitchen.

Trust yourself.

Trust the process.


See you at class.