LePolveri - micro panificio

"Aurora Zancanaro founded and runs her tiny little bakery in the center of Milan. She learned from her mother, growing up eating only what her mother would cook and bake. She mostly focuses on delicious bread, but also offers other baked goods and breakfast pastries, especially on Saturdays. The menu changes daily so check out her website to learn what's available. Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera wrote about her: "Sourdough aside, her trademark are the colorful turbans she knots on her head to keep her long brown hair in place while she bakes. But, in addition to a face that seems made to work on Instagram, there is much more in Aurora Zancanaro. Thirty-three years old, founder of "Le Polveri" in the Sant'Ambrogio area of ​​Milan, she is one of the very few new generation bakers. She tells it herself: the profession is still not very feminine, and this situation should change. After all, the work is hard: she kneads at all hours and the bags of flour to be lifted weigh 25 kilos. For Aurora Zancanaro there is certainly no valid reason to stop. And yet she shows herself to be realistic. In fact, she advises young women to approach the profession in a conscious way: "It is a step that must be accepted with the mind, but also with the body - she says in an interview -. For this reason, after bakery school, my suggestion is to try to work at least a year before definitively taking this path ». Hers is a curious path. She was born in Treviso, after high school she graduated in Industrial Chemistry at Ca 'Foscari, in Venice. She started working for a Venetian company that makes waterproof sheets, then at the university as a research fellow. But her enthusiasm was little. On the other hand, her family has always made bread at home with mother yeast. She knows what she is, she knows her scent, her timing. So she takes a pause for reflection and signs up for a baking course. All of of her studies her chemical knowledge suddenly becomes precious. And she opens up a world of possibilities. In Milan, during the Expo, she manages Mama Petra bakery at the Metropolitan Market. She then has an experience with Davide Longoni before Molino Vigevano asks her to manage a bakery in London. She packs her bags and part of her, but here she realizes she wants to open her own bakery. So she returns to Milan, finds the tiny space in via Ausonio and on November 30, 2017 she inaugurates «Le Polveri». Fifty square meters, with a beautiful frescoed ceiling, which contains everything: the laboratory, the oven, the refrigerator, the sales counter and a spectacular showcase in iron and glass on which the sign made by friends is placed. Today Zancanaro bakes three days a week, at a pace that allows her to do everything on her own. And with the slowness you need for good bread. In the afternoon she kneads her after having refreshed her three different mother yeasts, using 15 different flours from as many Italian mills. Towards evening the wheels are cooled to ripen and then enter the oven the next morning. She was asked if she didn't feel undermined doing the job she does with a chemistry degree in her pocket. In reality it is thanks to that, she is convinced, that «Le Polveri» was born. It is no coincidence that she calls her bakery a “panificio", not a “panetteria". Here the bread is created, it isn’t only sold.""

"On Saturday morning, a swarm of regulars concentrates in and around Le Polveri’s wooden outdoor seating space decorated with hanging dried flowers and mismatched stools. The wait to get inside Aurora Zancanaro's 50 square meter micropanifico (which can only accommodate one person at a time) is truly worth it. While her approach to bread initially made the shop a destination for locals, the leavened breakfast offerings soon rose to fame and are now also offered daily. The shop’s social media may hint to what's on offer, but you can almost always find a seasonal-fruit-topped pan brioche, cardamom and cinnamon buns, and a signature selection of bagged cookies. The cookies: savory kale and bitter chocolate with Maldon and rosemary will not likely survive long enough to make it to the inside of your cabinet. (It’s best to get your espresso elsewhere, as this is first and foremost a bakery.) "

"While Aurora Zancanaro's approach to bread initially made the shop a destination for locals, the leavened breakfast offerings are now also offered daily. Coffee is available on most morning making Le Polveri, a mostly takeaway spot."