{"id":20434,"date":"2023-09-13T08:36:48","date_gmt":"2023-09-13T06:36:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bakinglab.nl\/?p=20434"},"modified":"2024-02-26T14:34:55","modified_gmt":"2024-02-26T13:34:55","slug":"seven-questions-meet-ferdinand-doumic-baker-and-teacher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bakinglab.nl\/en\/news\/seven-questions-meet-ferdinand-doumic-baker-and-teacher\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven Questions: Meet Ferdinand Doumic, Baker and Teacher"},"content":{"rendered":"

More seven questions interviews:<\/a><\/p>\n

You\u2019ve been a baker here for over two years, can you introduce yourself to us?
\n<\/b>I\u2019m Ferdinand (34), I was born in Paris, raised in Angoul\u00eame, a small city between Bordeaux and Cognac in the south of France. Before going into baking I had the luxury to explore many different paths: I studied literature, music and digital project management, one after the other. I spent 6 years in corporate life, working in Paris and then Amsterdam. Then I studied acting with<\/span> Steven Ditmyer<\/span><\/a>, an American director training actors with the Meisner Technique. This brought me to act in a few plays, performances and movies. It was a very important part of my life, a journey of self-introspection you could say. You would think acting is all about wearing a mask, but it\u2019s actually mostly about dropping all masks.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And then Baking Lab entered my life in 2019. I\u2019m saying Baking Lab and not baking itself because I do many other things here: teaching, experimenting, learning about entrepreneurship, project management to name a few. It\u2019s a place where I can somehow connect the dots with many things I\u2019ve done in the past. Of course, baking, cooking, and working with food is a big part of my job. I love how it opens all of my senses, it forces a tandem between the body and the head. But I\u2019m also glad there is diversity in what I do, it keeps me sane!<\/span><\/p>\n

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The connection to your senses, is that the reason why you decided to become a baker?
\n<\/b>Partly yes. It started with a simple idea. Five years ago I thought \u201cwhy not make my own bread?\u201d It looked like a magical process from the outside. Something that requires patience, focus, intelligence, but also involves using your hands and all of your senses indeed. I\u2019m someone who needs to experience things with my body, get in touch with it physically to know if I like it or not, so soon enough I started at home and made a few loaves. Then I felt the need to learn more and maybe even become a baker. I emailed a number of bakeries in Amsterdam applying for a job, but most of them were looking for experienced bakers only. Thankfully, Baking Lab invited me to visit. They offered me a volunteering position, and for four months I worked with Elise, the head baker at the time as well as Ruchi, another volunteer who needed a break from her corporate life. The diversity of people, the space where everything is hanging, the crazy projects, all of it seemed so open and creative at Baking Lab. I felt at ease right very quickly. It was a clear sign that something at Baking Lab worked for me.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I stayed, I learned a lot from Elise as a volunteer, until one day I told her I needed to find a job, and preferably as a baker. I said I would love to stay at Baking Lab, but otherwise I would apply to other bakeries now that I had some basic skills. Elise said \u201cIt\u2019s good timing\u201d and now I\u2019ve been working full time at Baking Lab for over two years.<\/span><\/p>\n

I never really thought I would work in the horeca industry actually. But somehow I can still connect the dots. Once in high school, when I was a music major, a classical music professor told us \u201cjazz music is like cooking, you just put things together and hope it works\u201d. He was rather critical of it, and said it as if it wasn\u2019t a real art form… But I loved jazz music you know. I loved the improvisation, the freedom in it. You can really get to express yourself and be in the moment. Well now I cook all day, and just like with music I love the improvisational part of it. So maybe he was right in some ways. Though I think he was wrong about it not being an art form, both jazz and cooking.<\/span><\/p>\n