tone | bassasblog

When the tall person and De returned from the shops today they gave me a loaf of traditional Georgian bread.

I love bread.

The tall person told me that he had been given it for free. Wow! I asked who had given this generous gift and the tall person said he had taken a picture.

Argh! A fire breathing monster is using the offer of free bread to lure unsuspecting victims into its clutches.

You had a lucky escape tall person!

I later learned that the tall person had been given the bread by the baker he visited this morning when he was researching bread making for his new blog. Apparently, the fire breathing monster is actually a Georgian bread oven called a Tone.

Hmm, you are so naive tall person.

You can find more about the tall person’s encounter with the fire breathing philanthropist at: http://georgiaabout.wordpress.com/2012/06/07/about-food-georgian-bread-part-1/

There is a lot of news about bad bankers on television at the moment and how they have lost a lot of ‘dough’ so I thought it would be nice to talk about good bakers who make very good use of dough.

This is my baker. He makes delicious bread for me and the tall person and De and the little person and other families in my neighborhood.

He looks as if he is dressed to go to the beach but that is because the circular clay oven, called a tone (pronounced “ton-AY”), is very hot. In summer, the heat inside the bakery is almost unbearable.

The tall person likes to watch the baker make the traditional long pointed bread called shotis puri. The dough is stretched on to a long handled shovel and placed on the inside walls of the oven. When it is ready the baker uses long sticks to take the loaves out and puts them on slatted wooden shelves to cool. It smells fantastic!

The bread is very hot when it is freshly baked and when you buy it the baker will usually wrap it in a sheet of paper, otherwise it would be too hot to carry.