mucho mas mantecadas hoy

It's nice to be working in a supportive environment. Cupcakery gets zany...one minute we'll have a rack FULL of cupcakes decorated nicely, and production will be winding down but not over, and we'll all be going home in a couple hours. So we bake more to satisfy the evening rush, and then while those are nicely cooling the shop will get slammed, the stock will move and those nice end-of-the-day cupcakes will become the right now cupcakes...which means more end-of-the-day cupcakes, which means more baking, which means more work usually seven or seven point five hours into an eight hour shift. Last week I was about to get slammed this way, and it was Friday so I'd been working since five anyway and was hoping to make it to the Trans March in far-away Dolores Park or if things ran too late over to Mamasita's to have some sangria with my coworkers...All of a sudden there were no decorated cupcakes and I wasn't going anywhere anytime soon, until I finished production and frosted lots of cupcakes. My coworkers signed out changed into shimmery, tight, girly shirts and took their hair out of pigtails. They put on makeup. Then they frosted cupcakes for me.

It's been a long time since I dressed up nicely to go out. It's been a longer time since nicely dressed women helped me out of a jam.

Today (just like last Monday...) was slow to start off and then rushed and crazy toward the end. And I had an appointment at 3:30/4 but we didn't want to leave our coworkers with buttercreams to finish and six trays of cupcakes to bake, so we took inventory, finished baking the cupcakes, got them de-panned and ready for frosting, dealt with the plumbing emergency. I could have gone home earlier. I probably should have gone home what with the overtime and all. But I just couldn't do that to my lil punk baker.

Inspired by this post I think I'm going to go back to Bakesale Betty tomorrow and get some delicious scones to share with my coworkers on Sunday. And a little something for me. Also for Sunday: homemade pizza dough (not by me) with a surprise on top. Wild mushrooms? Bitter greens? Lil tomatoes? We're on such a bread kick. Even though our sourdough starter c o m b u s t e d.

Seriously. One morning we all came in and the yeasty living thing smelled like nailpolish remover. Was it the cake flour? Was the raisin water not providing enough natural yeast? Every time I fed it I'd look at it later and see how it had changed from a sad mixture to a bubbling living thing. I guess when you decide to wing breadmaking without knowing the intricacies (and we actually never made our own sourdough starter back in school in Boston) you're bound to run into some rough patches. So. Research. The breadmaking will not be stopped.

Thinking over what I want to do about something. Not sure yet.