Page 11 - aruba-today-20220720

a11
local Wednesday 20 July 2022

Zaida Everon:

The endeavor for nutritious bread for

her children became a unique bakery

From biologist to baker – was all the small and arti-
Zaida Everon says that it’s sanal bakeries wherever
thanks to her knowledge of she went. “In Aruba we are
biology that her sourdough used to buying commercial
bread is beloved, all the bread, which is heavily pro-
way to New York and other cessed.”
parts of the United States,
because ‘I never ate such Sourdough
a good bread’, as her cli- The idea to secure better
ents abroad tell her. food motivated Zaida to
read and find information,
Zaida Everon was known and that’s how she came
as one of the best cyclists, upon sour dough, bread mented with her family, she tion with sweet rolls, which
specialized in mountain with fermented dough. would gift them bread to she sold through Island
biking, of Aruba. But she Sour dough is bread with a have with coffee and ev- Grind. “So we grew togeth-
was also a teacher at Co- lot of vitamins, and it wasn’t eryone accepted it gladly. er. They found clients for
legio Arubano [secondary very common in Aruba. Her family would ask her me and I found clients for
education] and mother “The more I read about for bread, and at a certain them.” Social media con-
of two children, who also this bread, the more I re- point she started charg- tributed to her reputation
were very active in the alized how nutritious it is.” ing, and no one minded and the delivery of bread
sports world. her children’s well-being, as Zaida says that this type of paying. She expanded her grew from twice a week to
aside from school, they also bread, sour dough, made circle to her ex-colleagues four times a week. Nowa-
Zaida Everon was known dedicated a lot of time to her change her mind at Colegio Arubano, and days, her bakery is open
as a very disciplined sports- gymnastics. And that was about bread, that it’s ac- the reaction was similar. six days a week, Monday
woman. She would wake the moment when Zaida tually good, but it needs to As a good biologist, she through Saturday, although
up hours before any com- really started focusing on be a good bread and not knew that once the fla- they don’t bake on Satur-
petition in order to eat well what her children were one very processed. Zaida vor is in, the want for more day.
and give her body time to eating. Her focus was on found her bread. became natural, and this
digest the food. That meant nutrition, and so she started allowed Zaida to charge T2Pan
waking up at 4 or 5 in the reading about nutrition and In order to make sour for her bread, all made at Zaida started alone with
morning was never some- particularly bread, which bread, yeast is needed. home. And literally by word her bakery, and now she
thing unusual for her. But in Aruba is practically car- But to get the dough with of mouth, Zaida’s name has two full-time employ-
once her children started bohydrates without much yeast, it’s not simply a ques- and her bread’s reputa- ees and two freelance,
standing out in their own nutritional value. But dur- tion of combining the flour tion reached businessmen. aside from her children who
sports disciplines, she left ing this period, Zaida was and the culture, the right “I didn’t dare on my own also lend a hand helping
her own sport aside in or- traveling with her children balance is needed. “It took to approach business own- with sales and administra-
der to dedicate the time to for their international com- me about eight months ers. I was selling with family, tion. Her bakery’s name is
them. Everon left her bike petitions, and something to find the first sour dough neighbors, and acquain- T2, a variation of her dad’s
aside and was focused on that caught her attention bread which tasted good tances. I would send mes- name, Tito. The official
to eat”, Everon says. But sages on WhatsApp with name is T2 Pan Sourdough
what was also fermenting a description and a story, Bread Boutique, and the
in her head was the idea and an ex-colleague took bakery collaborates with
to start her own bread busi- the message and sent it specialized restaurant and
ness, the same sort of arti- to her friends circle. That’s with chefs. The first chef
sanal bakery that she ob- how the client base ex- who approached Zaida to
served abroad. panded.” make special bread ac-
cording to a theme was
With a sour dough which In record time, without Urvin Croes (of Infini res-
finally tasted good, and much experience in mar- taurant); but now even
the realization that she had keting but with tireless ener- chefs from New York have
another challenge to over- gy, Zaida started exhibiting ordered her bread. “The
come, Zaida decided to her product, among other, chef wanted this bread
change course. After toy- at the Cadushi Festival, and specifically.” The reason is
ing with the idea in 2018, this resulted in more clients. because Zaida can com-
beginning 2019 she took a At the start of 2020, she bine specific ingredients
course on bread in Aruba, was getting more orders according to the theme of
and took the drastic step and her business doubled, the menu. And the reason
of retiring as a teacher at and she was delivering the bread from T2 is so well-
Colegio Arubano. “I had bread twice a week. The liked is the starter – that is,
so much to give, a lot of pandemic, which made the yeast culture which she
creativity to just limit myself its mark in Aruba on march created herself. Each is dif-
and stay in one place. So I 2020, could have been a ferent and Zaida’s knowl-
decided to leave.” problem, but around 50 of edge of biology contrib-
her clients asked Zaida to uted to a unique starter,
Zaida decided to dedi- continue producing the which is the base for all her
cate herself to becoming bread and what’s more, bread, which is now tran-
a baker. Initially she experi- she expanded her produc- scending borders.q