Inside Claire Ptak’s white stucco East London bakery, Violet, staff are moving in careful syncopation. From the open doorway to the small kitchen and café, freshly baked feta-sour cream-and-chive scones and herb-laced quiches call to a steady stream of customers who stop to chat with Ptak and admire 5-month-old daughter Frances West, sitting in her lap.
A native Californian, Ptak is a rising star on the culinary scene—hailed by Jamie Oliver as “one of my all-time favorite cake-makers.” But Violet and Ptak are about more than being an of-the-moment patisserie. It is here that she carries out a fairly revolutionary approach to baking—Soft-whipped egg whites! Flour licking!—that sets her apart from the cookie-cutter mold.
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It was cold and gray and spiteful flurries of snow were whipping against the thin protection of my travel raincoat as I looked out over Salzburg, medieval and baroque buildings alike huddling in dark silhouette against the lowering sky. I was looking for the spot on the Winkler Terrace where Maria and the von Trapp children sang Do-Re-Mi and I was not finding it. Snowflakes were, however, landing on my nose and eyelashes so I was lyrically, if not geographically, in the zone.