Sonoma baker wins silver medal in the World Cup of Baking

Mike Zakowski of Sonoma was part of the three-man American team who took home a silver medal last month during the 2012 "World Cup of Baking" in Paris.

"Of course, we wanted the gold," Zakowski said of the team, which included Jeremey Gadouas of Seattle and Harry Peemoeller of Charlotte, N.C. "Japan won it, and Taiwan got third place."

The contest, founded in 1992 to honor the art and craft of artisan baking, is held every three or four years in conjunction with the Europain trade show in Paris. It is considered the Olympics of the baking world.

Try-outs for the USA Team, sponsored by the Bread Baker's Guild of America, started back in 2009. Zakowski was a national finalist for Team USA in 2005 and 2008, before being selected. for the 2010 team, which trained at the San Francisco Baking Institute.

"You can't not have practised," he said. "You have to make a lot of bread, and you have to go over the top."

Zakowski worked on the baguette and specialty breads in the contest. He said the highlight of the competition was making an organic and nutritional bread, a new category this year.

"I was able to bring all my ingredients from California," he said. "The bread was a 75 percent stone-milled California wheat called Yecora Rojo, a hard. red winter wheat that's an heirloom varietal. And then it had millet and toasted sunflower seeds."

The U.S. team was coached by Jeff Yankellow, board chair of the Bread Baker's Guild of America. Former competitor Craig Ponsford of Sonoma attended as a supporter.

Zakowski graduated from the Culinary Arts program at Kendall College in Chicago, Illinois and owned a bakery in Houston, Texas. He served as operations Manager at Artisan Bakers in Sonoma for five years

At the Sonoma Farmers Market on Fridays, Zakowski sells seven kinds of bread, including a rustic Pain de Campagne, Farro Spezzato made with cracked farro, Pain Biologique made with various seeds and a Cracked Kamut bread made from one of the world's oldest grains. Prices range from $6 to $10. He also offers whole wheat, organic soft pretzels for $4.

Sonoma County filmmaker Colin Blackshear attended the World Cup of Baking and is working on a documentary film about the process. For more information, go to Zakowski's website, thebejkr.com.