Keeping your starter jar alive at home
Feeding times, the right flour and water, and what to do when it smells odd or you go away for a week.
A morning in White Town with a warm loaf
Our favourite Puducherry breakfast walk: the promenade, the old streets and where to sit with bread and coffee.
Some of our customers collect their bread at 7 am and go straight to the sea with it, and it is hard to think of a better start to a day in Puducherry.
Start at the bakery on Rue Romain Rolland when the shutter goes up. Take a baguette or two croissants, and a jar of mango jam if you have a knife in your bag. Walk east for three minutes and you reach Goubert Avenue, the promenade, which is closed to traffic in the early morning. The light comes in low and gold off the Bay of Bengal, and the rocks are full of walkers and fishermen.
Walk south past the old lighthouse and the war memorial, then turn back into the grid of the French Quarter. The streets of yellow and white houses, with bougainvillea over the walls, are at their quietest before 8. Rue Dumas and Rue Suffren are good for a slow wander.
For coffee, any of the small cafés near the Bharathi Park end of the quarter will open by 7.30, and most do not mind you bringing a croissant. The park itself has benches under old trees and is cool until about 9. If you are staying longer, the Sunday market on Mission Street and the fish market near the old port are worth a morning each. Bring your bread bag.
