Tyler was in at 4am to start the ovens and the Carrot Bay Satellite Kitchen was baking muffins and pie fillings. As the previous 72 hours had been a jumble of shopping and deliveries (fridges, flour, The Till, signs, labels etc) just about the last thing we had managed to get round to was the ......food.
We were so focused on trying to get everything ready that we hardly noticed our first customer at 7:31am. At the back of my mind I had a sense that this was a fairly historic moment and greeted him with a huge smile and a very loud "Welcome!" Our VIP then proceeded to mumble "Top Up Airtime and beer?" to which I had to, very disappointingly, say "no, but wouldn't you like some freshly baked bread instead"? His reply was a fairly abrupt "nah" and walked out! Not a very auspicious start to our dream business but still a start nevertheless.
The past 4 days have passed in a blur. It's been a rollercoaster of heat, exhaustion, delight and an overwhelming relief that not only are we finally open but that we've been well supported.
It was probably a bit naive of us to think that we could slip under the radar with a soft opening before the season officially starts again (1 October). We've sold out everyday with customers waiting patiently for things to come out of the oven. We are still in a building site and until some key things have been completed we cannot really employ staff. Knowing that this was always going to be the compromise (ie. keep waiting for the building to finish sometime-never or go bankrupt before we'd even opened) we chose this route. We just have to keep going now and trust that it will all work out.
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| James, left, in red vest and Georgie centre. Photo Ed Childs. |
Today we've tried to take it a bit easy before we get going again and I've sort of lost the Battle of the Houseas we're wading through a weeks worth of school clothes and nutty animal mess (Gracie shredded all our porcupine quills, for example, and downstairs now looks like a Graaf Reniet farmhouse). A very concerted effort is needed to find a new cleaner before the house goes completely feral. [Postscript: Saturday. Huzzar!].
As all we had focused on was getting the bakery up and running on Wednesday, we've not thought too much about our new life as Mr & Mrs Baker & Kids. The reality is going to be a master class in juggling, scheduling and low level flying as we keep the show on the road. After 6 months of soul destroying stop/start wheel spinning this is a delightful 'problem' to have, however and we just cannot keep the smiles off our faces and the incredible feeling of knowing that we've finally done it - we opened the bakery!
An epic week for our family.
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