Why I Fell in Love with Bread: A Journey That Began in France

People often ask me how I became so passionate about bread.

The answer is simple: I fell in love with it while living in France.

Visiting the local boulangerie quickly became much more than a daily routine—it was a cultural experience that changed the way I looked at food forever.

On weekdays, I would stop by my neighbourhood bakery in the early evening. At weekends, I loved arriving in the morning just as the first batch came out of the oven. The smell of freshly baked bread drifting through the streets was simply irresistible.

Of course, there were the famous baguettes. But there was also so much more: buttery croissants, rich pain au chocolat, rustic pain de campagne, and beautiful loaves filled with nuts, raisins and dried fruit.

One thing that fascinated me was the rhythm of French bakeries. Many boulangeries bake twice a day—once in the morning and again in the late afternoon or early evening—so customers can enjoy fresh bread throughout the day. Large bakeries may have separate baking teams, while smaller family bakeries simply work around this daily cycle.

Bread wasn’t treated as a special occasion. It was part of everyday life.

Fresh bread accompanied breakfast before work and dinner with family in the evening. It was woven into daily routines, bringing people together around the table.

Living in France completely changed my perspective.

When I returned to the UK, I started baking bread at home simply as a hobby. At first, I just wanted to recreate the wonderful breads I had enjoyed in France.

But something unexpected happened.

The more I baked, the more I realised that bread was about far more than flour, water, yeast and salt.

It had the power to bring comfort after a long day, to make an ordinary meal feel special, and to gather family and friends around one table.

Eventually, baking became much more than a hobby—it became a passion.

And today, I can’t imagine life without bread.

In the next post, I’d like to share why I believe bread is so much more than just something we eat, and why it has become the heart of everything I do at Kuma-San Bakehouse.