YEAST OF EDEN
ROB DEWALT / The New Mexican

My first restaurant gig upon returning to Santa Fe from college in 1991 was at a place on Guadalupe Street called Becker's Delicatessen. It was the kind of place that just oozed that "local hangout" vibe. Part cafe, part bakery, and part patisserie, it was the first place where I'd seen an uncooked bagel plunged into hot, water before baking. It was the first time I'd ever used an automatic bread slicer. Contraption that looked more like a robotic velociraptor than a machine of commercial convenience. The owner. As I recall. Was tough but fair on her staff her quality standards were pristine Fifteen years later Becker's Delicatessen is, sadly gone. The good news is that there are still plenty of quality/bakery. I can visit to relive those sweet and savory memories of yeast and crumb.
Le Zodiac Cafe, Salon de Thé and Bakery is Santa Fe's youngest cafe/bakery formerly occupied by Garrett's Spot in Garrett's Desert Inn, the remodeled Space is a welcome addition to the 1owver Old Santa Fe Trail neighborhood. 1 know this space well. In 1999, I worked as a sous chef within those walls when it was Lola's Cafe Libertad, a short-lived, family-friendly, Cuban-themed restaurant. Before that, I frequented Le Cafe in the same space, a cafe bakery opened by Cafe Paris' Paul Perrier in 1994. For all of the businesses that have failed to grow roots in this room, I'm convinced that Le Zodiac - open about two months - can break the curse. Gone is the dark, stuffy interior that plagued the space for many years. The racy fireplace - painted naked ladies didn't really spell family-friendly - has been removed, and the wooden floors are accented by welcoming hues of yellow and cream. The menu is a competent blend of room-service mainstays - burgers, salads, eggs, cold sandwiches - and French specialties - pates, quiches, nicoise salads, brioche - rounded out by a fine selection of teas from around the globe. The owners arc French to the core, and while they don't chat much; they are a friendly helpful bunch. My early-morning request for a tartine (open-faced sandwich) of country pate,cornichon(gherkin pickles), and a mixed-greens salad might have thrown them for a loop, but they indulged me. I took my food to go and was surprised to find no Dijon-style mustard with the order. The crusty, sour, whole-wheat bread stood up well to The pepper chunky, country-style liver pate, which was some of the best I've ever had - even without the mustard. The brioche at Le Zodiac is small hut rich and buttery. Order a few extra to take home; they make the lightest French toast the next day. Looking into the pastry display case is enough to make dieters throw caution to the wind: everything from chocolate croissants to strata (savory)' Italian bread pudding) to cannoli stare back at you - fluffy and glistening. As an added incentive to dine at Zodiac, they roll out three daily specials and use organic eggs. Dairy products, and meats when possible. I was too early on two occasions to test-drive the specials, but if they do entrees'like they do lattes. you'll be leaving fat and happy Grab a loaf of Zodiac focaccia, ciabatta. or other bread 0n the ,way out, and sip on a strong Himalayan Darjeeling tea - hot or cold - to keep the road rage at bay.

IN SHORT
Le Zodiac Cafe, Salon de The and Bakery, Santa Fe's newest bakery/cafe, brings a touch of France to lower Old Santa Fe Trail with a stellar selection of pastries, sandwiches, coffees, teas, and breads. The open-faced chunky pate sandwich is a taste of the old country not to be missed. May 26 - June I, 2006 —continued on Page 82

TOTALLY BAKED
GWYNETH DOLAND / Santa Fe Reporter       

In the past few weeks I’ve written about pizza joints downtown and some favorite bakeries in the city.  I made two notable omissions, one on purpose and one because I smoked way too much pot in college.  I regret that I forgot to mention Fatso’s pies, the big-as-a-flying-saucer pizzas at WilLee’s Blues Club.  What was I thinking?  Fatso’s is a favorite of SFR staffers and all light-night eaters downtown.

In addition, I recently wrote about bakeries for “Eat it,” but I purposefully left out a new one called Le Zodiac.  I wanted to take more time to talk about this very authentic French bakery and café that opened about a month ago on Old Santa Fe Trail in the Old Garrett’s Spot space between Alameda and the Roundhouse.  One cloudy afternoon last week I managed to corner owner Frederic Allouët for a long conversation about his breads and trying to recreate the memories of the flavors of his youth in France. Here are some excerpts from our chat.

SFR: [After a somewhat lengthy discussion of the spelling of his last name}. Your name is from Brittany.  Is that where you grew up?

FA: No, I was born and raised in Versailles, the closet provincial town to Paris.  You drive for eight miles and it’s like you drove 100 miles.

I was just in France in November and I made t hat drive—it is a beautiful countryside.  What took you away from Versailles?
I went to Paris to work as a music producer.  I came here in 2001, to visit a friend who was living here, and like many other people, I fell in love.  The ultimate luxury when you come from Europe is emptiness, free space. I felt very refreshed and regenerated here.

If your background was in the music business, what made you decide to open a bakery here?
In Versailles my family had a salon de thé and patisserie (teahouse that serves pastries), which is very common in Europe; they take a break in the afternoon and have a little cake and some tea.  When I came here I thought this was definitely not the place for music production…

Not so much!
…So I scouted and checked all the bakeries around and I got the feeling that it could be a place for that.  There are a couple places here that are good, but in France or even in Manhattan there is a bakery on every corner.

Do you do all the baking or does someone else?
To update my knowledge I went to a baking school in Rouen, in Normandy.  It’s one of the best in France.  When I came here and finally found a location, I called a friend who is a French baker…He came here and he set all the recipes for us because of the elevation and the dryness.  I told him what kind of breads I wanted to offer and we worked together adjusting the recipes, testing the amount of water, the amount of starter.

You’re using a wild yeast starter?
It’s a French sourdough starter, levain.  It’s milder and less sour than San Francisco sourdough.  Also, we’re using exclusively organic flour here.  They’re using so much chemicals in the processing of flour here (the US) that you can’t get the proper quality of bread.

So what kinds of bread do you make?
Our pride is a bread called Le Zodiac…The secret is the flour which is stone ground. The dough can hold over 73 percent water…so the bread can last for a week without drying out.  This type of bread was made for people in the mountainous countryside of France who went only once a week to the village to buy bread.  If you keep it under a dry cloth or in a paper bag we give you, it will stay moist.  We bake four-pound loaves—big and round with a Z on the top—that we cut and sell by the pound.
            Also we have a baguette made from poulish, a kind of overnight starter.  It’s a baguette de tradition not an industrial baguette. (In France, “Baguette de Tradition” has a legal definition; the bread can only be made using overnight starter and 18th century techniques.)
            We do a farm bread, a one-pound boule (round loaf) made with levain. Also a ciabatta, with olive oil in the dough, which is really good for sandwiches.  And we make our own buns for burgers.

And pastries?
We make croissants, pain au chocolate, pain au raisin (made with a custard) and brioche, which is very Parisan.  When brioche is very fresh it’s fantastic. I was born and raised with brioche and I miss it.

And you use your breads for sandwiches?
Our baker is the foundation for the menu. We’re using all of the breads for different sandwiches, like the Zodiac bread to do a tartine, an open-face sandwich.  Le Zodiac is a strong-tasting bread with character, and we do an Italian tartine with pesto, prosciutto, mozzarella, tomatoes, and fresh basil.  The Zodiac is lightly toasted and we spread all these ingredients on it.  We have the Provençal, with tapenade, goat cheese, and tomato, and the Spanish with Serrano ham and manchego cheese.  Our pan bagnat is made with tuna and hard-boiled eggs on ciabatta.  We also offer the typically Parisian Croque Monsieur with cheese, Black Forest Ham and béchamel souce on Zodiac bread. We make our own quiche, with specials every day, and salads, like salade nicoise, and cobb salade.