From midnight to the wee hours of the morning, there’s a choreographed dance that unfolds in Samia Sait’s bakery at Neelankarai, ECR. As one team of bakers troupes in, mixes ingredients for dough, weighs them out into exact loaves and moulds them into shape, another set slices sheets of dough into quick 100-gm triangles, whisks them into little crab-like curves and sends them to proof into ovens “big enough to fit two people”. As they rise into crisp croissants, the quiches are lined and filed and soon, they go in too. Meanwhile, the breads get their signature cuts — a sharp slice through the country loaves, four lines through the baguettes, rings on the beer breads... Into the oven they go too, and rise, while the sun rises outside. By dawn, they’re ready to make their appearance on Tryst cafe’s enviable array of homemade, organic, vegan breads.
“I’m a far better baker than a cook,” laughs Samia, “And that’s funny considering I’ve run a cafe for five years!” Known for its leisurely ambience, rich burgers and most recently, its wood-fired pizzas, Tryst ventured into artisan breads at the close of last year, thanks to Samia’s desire to experiment. Until then, she sourced her breads every morning from bakers in Pondicherry. “I’ve always been a home baker, and at the cafe, I noticed there was a growing need among customers for good, wholesome breads; so instead of buying them daily, we decided to try and bake them ourselves.” Thus, in December, Samia converted their upper storeroom into a bakery and opened operations, producing almost 90 per cent of the breads they were thus far buying.
Tryst’s signature bread is the kraftkorn — a malt-rye bread that is also their healthiest for its least serving of maida. Dark-crusted and quite stern-looking, it contains wheat, soya, flax seeds, oats, sunflower seeds and a host of other ingredients rich in fibre. While baguettes are their bestsellers, Samia also takes pride in her beer bread and her levain — a slightly unshapely loaf of sourdough that she says goes well with soups. Alongside are an assortment of danishes and quiches too. All of Tryst’s ingredients are sought locally, save for a few imported flours; they also make their rising agents in-house and use no preservatives. “Our breads will last you seven days only if you freeze them; left outside, they’d lose life in two, at most three days.” With the production process happening every night through the week, Samia says they minimise wastage by repurposing day-old bread into dried and toasted breadcrumbs that make their way into the remainder of the cafe’s menu.
A good deal of Tryst’s bread menu has been shaped by the needs of her family, says Samia. For instance, her brother recently discovered an allergy to gluten, and hence she ventured into gluten-free avatars of all her breads. Encouragement has also come from Tryst’s largely expat-clientele. From the British, Australian and American embassies that buy her breads from the Nungambakkam outlet, to the French, German and Italian customers who frequent the ECR cafe, they all advise her on how better to do her European breads. While Tryst’s breads are certainly steeply priced, Samia says there is an expanding customer base locally too. “There’s increased awareness about how to use such breads in everyday meals; people realise that the taste is flavourful, and that things that are healthy for you, do come with a price!”
Tryst Café is located at Gatsby Village 359, East Coast Road, Neelankarai. A loaf of bread is priced between Rs.40 and Rs.220
