The Old Country

Written for Muse On Monday. David asks
us to write a story where a mistake ends up
being beneficial. Here’s where the prompt took me.

Zeke had watched exactly one bread-making video on TikTok before deciding he had what it took to be a master baker.

“It’s just flour and water,” he told his wife, Pam, with the confidence of a man who had never once made bread.

He mixed his starter, left it on the counter, and forgot about it for more than a week. When he finally lifted the lid, something looked back at him. Not literally, but almost. The starter had developed a grey liquid layer on top and smelled like an ancient civilization.

He fed it anyway. It bubbled aggressively, almost angrily.

Three days later, Zeke baked a loaf. It emerged from the oven flat, dense, and shaped vaguely like a Birkenstock sandal. Pam poked it without leaving a dent.

“Might make a good doorstop,” she offered.

Zeke, undeterred, sliced it. They chewed in silence for a very long time.

But that evening, their neighbor, JeanMichel …. a man of few words and strong opinions …. stopped by, tried a slice, and froze mid-chew.

“This tastes like Poilâne, the bread my grandmother made in Paris,” he said quietly.

Turns out Zeke’s aggressive neglect had accidentally produced a hyper-fermented sourdough in exactly the old-world style. Jean-Michel asked for the recipe.

Zeke wrote it down with great authority, omitting the part where he simply forgot it existed.

He now sells twelve loaves a week at the farmer’s market.

This is “Song Of A Baker” by Small Faces