29 March 2020 - ABANDONED BREAD FACTORY, Buffalo, New York

Abandoned Bread Factory

in Buffalo, New York

G'day folks,

Here we go again. Another abandoned factory, and a forsaken wonder in the middle of the East Side neighborhood. 

The Wonder Bread factory, built in 1923, was once an industrial icon of Buffalo’s East Side. While it was in operation, the facility produced that classic midcentury staple, as well as Hostess brand snacks. The first floor held massive Wonder ovens, making the surrounding neighborhood smell faintly of bread.

The 180,000-square-foot, steel-reinforced concrete building was built with tall ceilings, large south-facing windows, and an open layout to maximize the natural light. The blond brick exterior was topped with Roman arch-style windows that were popular with mill buildings in the late 19th century.

The factory closed in 2004, and has sat empty ever since, in an ever-worsening state of decay. Around 2010 (the same year the building was listed for sale for $800,000), the letter “B” from the giant “Wonder Bread” sign at the top of the building mysteriously went missing. Some months later, the “N” followed, and later the “E.”

The factory remains abandoned today, with just enough fading letters intact to make out its former name.

 Clancy's comment: Mm ... Imagine the great smell you would have had every day if you lived nearby. Enough to make you put on weight. Hey, the three letters that went missing were probably stolen by someone named BEN. Just a thought ...

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16 August 2020 - BAKED GOODS MADE INTO ART

BAKED GOODS

 MADE INTO ART

G'day folks,

Art comes in many forms. 

Most of us probably assume bread and pastries are better to eat than to look at. But that might change when you take a look at the creations of a North Carolina based baker that goes by the name Hannah P. Her baked goods are as beautiful as they are appetizing.

 

Her talent has got her quite the following on social media, too - the Instagram account called ‘Blondie + Rye’ currently boasts 119K followers, and you’ll soon understand the reason why. 

 Hannah’s creations are covered in flour art resembling twisting vines and leafy stems. Sometimes, they are even decorated with fruits and vegetables, in beautiful arrangements that will remind you of flower bouquets or serene gardens.

Clancy's comment: Pretty cool, eh? I'm impressed.

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3 February 2019 - Hungarians Make the World’s Most Beautiful Gingerbread

Hungarians Make the 

World’s Most 

Beautiful Gingerbread

G'day folks,

Yep, Christmas, Easter, and weddings all call for the spicy dough.

  You might already know about Hungarian gingerbread. After all, in 2018, a set of cookie-decorating videos made their way around the internet. In them, a pair of hands busily lays line after line of white icing with the mathematical accuracy of a 3D printer. Incongruously, the baker pipes a vaguely Old World piece of embroidery atop the cookie in mere minutes. The videos, which were many people’s first introduction to the elaborate, painstaking art of Hungarian gingerbread, went viral.

Such masterful work, at least to me, seems to exist almost entirely on the internet or in the realm of “cookiers” extraordinaire. But gingerbread artists walk among us.

At a Hungarian Christmas fair, I saw traditional gingerbread art by Klara Repas. While Repas is not the baker in these viral videos (that honor goes to decorator Tunde Dugantsi), her creations were equally stunning, and prompted me to ask for a demonstration.

A week later, I visit Repas at her sunny New Jersey home, overlooking the Hudson River. (I’m ignoring my coworkers’ jokes, inspired by Hansel and Gretel, about fleeing at the first sight of a human-sized oven.) There’s a tiny gingerbread house on an entryway table, mitten and star cookies along a sideboard, and deep Tupperware bowls filled with undecorated cookies on the counter. Repas herself is soft-spoken and elegant, donning a pair of eyeglasses every time she needs to peer at the fine pattern of her gingerbread, or mézeskalács.

While it’s mainly a Christmastime treat in countries such as the U.S., Repas says gingerbread is a year-round affair in Hungary, made by bakers for weddings, Easter, and birthdays. In this respect, her homeland hews to “very old tradition,” she says. Ancient Greeks enjoyed an ancestor of gingerbread, cakes made with honey, and put it in the mouths of the dead for the trip to the afterlife. In many countries, bakers made honey cakes for all kinds of events, such as saint’s days. In the days before icing, the dough was pressed into carved wooden molds, and esteemed bakers had their own proprietary designs. 

Clancy's comment: Not only, it's good for you. A friend recently made some of those gingerbread houses and they were simply gob smacking.

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