Photo courtesy Brent Wasser
It’s art. Dan Williams slid a peel, the large paddle used to maneuver food in and out, across the blackened floor of the North Adams Community Oven and produced a golden loaf. It landed with a hollow thump on a table under the spring sun.
This boule showed the traits of a wood-fired sourdough: a thick helmet of crisp crust, an airy form bulging with steam, and the unique perfume of native North Adams yeast and sweet smoke.
Peering through the oven’s small door, Williams aimed an infrared thermometer at the back of the dome: The firebrick still glowed at 400˚F., hot enough to bake a casserole or cook a stew. “We once spatchcocked [split and spread open], a chicken and roasted it in the oven. Holy moly, it was mind-blowing!” he said.
The oven, now in its second year, continues to inspire amazement and foster community under Canadian artist Eryn Foster’s vision. The wood-fired brick oven seems small in the shadow of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (Mass MoCA) along River Street in North Adams, but it delivers defiantly big results. Fired with one large load of hardwood, the oven maintains consistent temperatures for hours, yielding crisp pizza and hearty bread with uniform thick crust. These unique textures are out of reach for home bakers using typical gas or electric ovens.
Community oven users can also “cascade bake,” taking advantage of the different temperature ranges as the mass of brick and mortar slowly cools over many hours. At 700˚F. the oven turns out crisp, yeasty pizzas in only a few minutes. At 550˚, it is ideal for throwing in a couple of loaves and sealing the door to produce weighty sourdough bread. At 400˚, stews and casseroles slowly cook to uniquely flavorful results.
All this is available to those who venture out to participate in this community project, where baking at the oven over several hours is a social event. It’s just as Foster intended.
“I am very interested in the notion of art as gift,” said Foster, who built the oven as a community offering during Mass MoCA show Oh, Canada. The installation, “North Adams Sourdough: A Gift of Cultured Culture,” involved cultivating a native North Adams sourdough culture and making it available to museum visitors. Foster built the oven in the public park on River Street near the museum as an extension of the exhibit and a lasting contribution to the community.
“It was always my hope and intention that the oven would continue to be used by the community. I imagine the space will evolve, adapt and grow over time,” said Foster.
Jennifer Munoz, manager of the River Street Community Garden, was thrilled to see the oven go up on the strip of green by the Hoosic, not far from raised beds bursting with vegetables.
“When MoCA contacted me about an artist who wanted to create a community bake oven as part of her art installation, I immediately thought of River Street due to its proximity to the museum, visibility from The Porches Inn, and the possible synergy with the newly installed River Street Community Garden,” she said, adding, “We have baked thin-crust pizzas and some bread as yummy as any I have tasted in Italy!”
Munoz is not alone in her excitement to see the oven develop interest from residents in the immediate area.
Over 30 people have trained to use the oven, and the number is sure to rise this summer. Aspiring bakers must complete an oven-use course before they try their hands at their own work of art. Williams organizes the classes and hopes to double that number this summer with monthly sessions continuing through September. Participants learn how to effectively heat the oven and prepare it for pizza or bread, techniques for achieving uniform loaves (think dancing with the peel and how to ready the oven for the next person.
Trained people gain access to the oven key, which is kept at the North Adams Department of Health on Main Street. Long summer evenings are likely to find the oven in high demand as this community grows, but using it is inherently a sharing exercise.
“There’s literally a smoke signal alerting the neighborhood that something’s going on, so you’re almost guaranteed to have a conversation while you’re out there,” said Williams. People passing in their cars tend to slow down as he pulls piping hot bread out of the oven. But what becomes of the North Adams sourdough starter, now that Oh, Canada has gone traveling? Foster noted, “I wanted to make something that could potentially live on indefinitely and could be given away infinitely; an immortal and ever-expanding work of art.”
This is certainly happening, and the starter is tasty, too. Williams describes the sourdough as “vigorous and mild-tasting, and quite good for baking.” He currently holds the culture, and is happy to share it with anyone. With time, refrigerators across the city could become populated by this unique product of place. As the starter spreads, so will the sense of community captured in this tangible, edible, and participatory effort.
“Since North Adams does not have a town green, my hope is to create a space where people can come together and garden, bake, perhaps picnic, and/or have music or other small community performances,” said Munoz.
The fire is started for the season, and it is sure to produce masterpieces.
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