Braamfontein bakery rises above with handcrafted loaves

If you’ve ever eaten a slice of rye bread or had a continental roll at a high-end hotel in Joburg, chances are it came from Black Forest Bakery.

It’s one of the few surviving family businesses in the city centre and Braamfontein is all the richer for its staying power.

The fragrant, hunger-stirring whiffs of freshly baked bread and pastries is unmistakable.

Bakery older than half a century

The Vandereydt-Speer family has been feeding the city for almost half a century. But the bakery is older than that.

“It started in 1935 as Café Echo, opposite the German Club on Loveday Street in Selby,” Maika Vandereydt-Speer said.

She runs the business with her husband, Chris.

ALSO READ: Wits University’s Pitso Ya Kalaneng festival celebrates art in all its forms [VIDEO]

“Club members would head over after spending time at the club for coffee and cake. It was small, just a confectionery shop, but well-known. Always German-owned,” she said.

Her in-laws bought it in 1976. And during inner-city development, demolition notices started going up in the ’80s. Echo Café moved to Rissik Street then to Braamfontein in 1998.

“It used to be a catering kitchen for the once famous restaurant Linger Longer, so we turned it into something that worked for us.”

Business grew as city changed

The space grew as the city changed and so did the business.

“We started focusing on wholesale instead of confection – hotels, canteens, restaurants. The daily bread business,” she said.

That bread, including rye loaves fermented for hours, sourdoughs, seeded rolls, all shaped and baked by hand, remain the bakery’s core business.

ALSO READ: ‘My sister met her husband here’: Jason Goliath shares his favourite memories as Kitcheners reopens [VIDEO]

“We’re scratch bakers,” Vandereydt-Speer said. “We don’t buy premixes. We buy raw ingredients and make our own. Even a basic white loaf is shaped by hand.”

They produce up to 600 loaves and 1 000 rolls a day.

“We do six kinds of wheat-free bread too. It’s what the market needs,” she said.

600 loaves and 1 000 rolls produced a day

It’s a 24 hour operation. A night shift bakes through until morning, delivering from 4.30am to make breakfast service across the city.

“The logistics are probably the hardest part,” Vandereydt-Speer said. “You’ve got to get the right goods, baked fresh, packed carefully and delivered on time, without damaging them. A loaf of bread is not just a brick. We need to make sure it arrives in the same state it left in.”

Loaves and rolls are all handshaped. “We don’t use a lot of machines. And most of our staff have been here for years; they’re part of the family. We have about 36 people now, from admin to bakers and drivers.”

ALSO READ: M1 reopened after protest action near Braamfontein [VIDEO]

It’s not a business for sissies. “You’ve got to keep customers happy, quality consistent, deliveries on time and always stay in touch with what chefs and restaurant owners need,” she said.

The bakery is still recovering from the pandemic. “We lost clients. Now, a lot of people only want cheaper bread. They don’t care what’s in the bread.”

Her late father-in-law was credited with bringing San Francisco-style sour dough bread to South Africa and developing many of the varieties of rye available locally.

Bread can be good for you

Vandereydt-Speer has another bugbear – the anti-bread movement spawned by various diets.

She believes bread can be good for you.

“Rye, especially when fermented properly, is filling, better for digestion, and nutritious. You don’t need to eat as much,” she said.

NOW READ: UPDATE: Kunene promises sinkhole in Braamfontein will be fixed