About the bakery

Kestrel Bakery is a small bakery in Keene with one wood-fired oven and a short list of breads, made slowly.

Why the bread takes two days

Our country loaf starts the morning before you buy it: the starter fed at six, the dough mixed at noon, a long, cool night in its basket, and the oven before dawn.

The slow rise is where the flavour comes from, and it's why the crust keeps.

Shaped at the bench

Every loaf is weighed, folded and shaped by hand at the bench, then scored with a blade just before it goes in the oven.

Hands kneading dough on a floured wooden board

A baking morning

2 a.m. the oven is lit
48 hours from starter to country loaf
7 a.m. the shelves are full

It is more difficult to give rules for making bread than for anything else; it depends so much on judgment and experience.
Lydia Maria Child, The American Frugal Housewife, 1832

Loaves baking inside a cast-iron wood oven, its door open — Loaves part way through the bake, on the hot floor of a wood-fired oven.