Simó from the s’ERA bakery: “Salut i bon pa sempre” (“Always health and good bread”)

A passion for the trade and the birth of S’ERA

I have always enjoyed working with my hands. Since my teenage years, my life has been closely linked to activities involving handling objects, creating through physical transformation and then observing the actual result in front of me. I need to start and finish a task in one go, without interruptions.

Although I do not come from a family of bakers, I was very fortunate to have their support in my unusual decision to devote my career to baking. In my family, we have a saying: ‘Whatever you do, do it well.’ And so, at the age of 22, I set off for Barcelona (literally) to discover the profound world of fermentation, dough and the craft of baking.

I started working in a well-known fleca (bakery) in the city, immersing myself in the world of nightlife, which was completely foreign to me. Long days dedicated to bread and cakes would come later and reveal to me first-hand the two impressions that have always accompanied me throughout my life and that today define S’ERA, my bakery: how immensely interesting this craft is and how hard it is to live it.

From apprentice in Barcelona to master in Germany

Hungry for knowledge, I travelled to northern Europe, near Hamburg, where I worked in several Demeter bakeries, the highest global standard for organic products. A whole new world of knowledge about flours, ingredients, fermentation and techniques opened before me. I stayed in the city for several years after completing my dual training as a baker and obtaining the master degree as artisan baker in Hanover.

I learned a lot during that time, especially about rye, a cereal that was unknown to me until then. The various German sourdoughs, their processes and their potential for facilitating and organising the working day aroused great interest. Dense, moist and very aromatic breads quickly became my favourite food, and I couldn’t stop trying them in all the bakeries I found around me.

I also realised the importance of a craft as ancient as baking. I loved certain rituals of the working day in the bakery and the pride with which the bakers expressed their love for their work. Collaboration between bakeries was common, and there was a shared desire to improve to offer the highest quality to the end customer.

However, at the same time, I realised the enormous personal cost of traditional baking, with early mornings or even all-night shifts. My social life had largely disappeared, or I paid for it with sleep patterns that were incompatible with a healthy lifestyle.

I reached a turning point: either I gave up this profession, or I found a way to enjoy it on my own terms.

S’ERA: a return to the natural cycle of work

And so S’ERA (‘The Threshing Floor’, in English) was born.

Years and years of working in bakeries gave me the ability to sit back and observe everything I had liked about each workshop. I decided to take a risk and design S’ERA, my own workshop, in Sineu, a small village in Mallorca. The vision of a quality artisan bakery soon came to mind. I wanted to work during the day, take advantage of the hours of sunshine that I had missed so much for so many years and return to the natural cycle of work. I am convinced that traditional baking did not originate at night; it was modern baking, driven by the desire to have warm bread in the morning, that prompted us all to work in the early hours of the morning.

It was risky, but my motivations for completely losing the morning sales slot and dedicating myself to the afternoon are as follows:

– To work during the day without the need for controlled fermentation.

– To serve potential customers (working people) who do not have time in the morning or who even enjoy going to buy “freshly baked” bread in the afternoon.

– To produce larger, higher-quality loaves that allow customers to come only once or twice a week and enjoy the bread until their next purchase.

Without meaning to, I had adapted my desired lifestyle to my production: four days of sales (Tuesday to Friday) and four hours of sales (3pm to 7pm). And it works!

My working day usually starts around 7.30 a.m. and is divided into three phases: production, setting up the shop and selling in the afternoons. Every day begins and ends. I work without controlled fermentation doughs and pre-ferment most of the flour the day before in the form of pre-doughs (wheat) and sourdoughs (wheat or rye). I use a Monheimer Salzsauer, a rye or wheat sourdough with 2% salt added (based on the weight of the flour), which I ferment for about 20 hours in winter and 18 hours in summer. It is a very stable sourdough starter that allows me to regulate production, adapt it to the course of the morning and, above all, allows me to rest for two days (Saturday and Sunday) as it keeps perfectly in the cold over the weekend and allows me to start the pre-ferments for the following week with a starter.

Quality, local produce and sustainable sales

Production focuses on sourdough breads, using local and organic ingredients whenever possible, such as almonds, rice from our lagoon and extra virgin olive oil. I work with both flours from the peninsula (e.g. rye) and a local variety of wheat called Xeixa, which gives me very good results in breads with a high percentage of wholemeal flour. ‘La Prima’, the house bread, is a golden, crispy rye and wheat bread that is made daily. The rest of the breads come and go from production as if they were on a restaurant menu, providing a very attractive surprise factor for customers.

I also make seasonal pastries with fruit or nuts, as well as my speciality German Stollen at Christmas, which I have ‘adapted to Mallorcan taste’ by using only local nuts and Mediterranean spices.

I encourage my customers to reserve their bread so that I can adjust production to the maximum. After two and a half years, I can say that I am very satisfied with this system, which allows me to have minimal bread waste and not produce excessively.

The concept of the shop is also very open, showing the processes, ingredients and machinery, I use. I love the direct contact with customers, and it is a bonus that I want to add to the bread: a correct, friendly and professional sale.

With S’ERA Forn Artesà, my intention is to revalue the village bakery, where quality and friendly service are paramount and based largely on traditional ingredients and recipes.

I have managed to prove to myself that it is possible to combine an ambitious and professional working life as a baker with a schedule that allows for rest, socialising and the promotion of creativity. As we would say in Sineu: Salut i bon pa, sempre!(“Always health and good bread”)

Simó Moreno, baker at Forn de s’ERA in Sineu