OF JAZZ AND SOURDOUGH – Jyan Isaac Bread
In the competitive culinary scene of Santa Monica, California, a small bakery has been making quite an impression. Jyan Isaac Bread, where owner and baker Jyan Isaac (born Jyan Isaac Horwitz), at the tender age of 22, has been nourishing the local community with his artisanal sourdough loaves, baguettes, bagels, and other baked goods for just over three years.
The bakery's Instagram-worthy bread has not only attracted a loyal following of locals but has also caught the attention of food enthusiasts, bloggers, and tourists from around the world. (Jyan Isaac Bread was named in Food & Wine magazine’s January 2022 feature The Best Bread in Every State as one of the top 5 bread bakeries in California.)
Intrigued, I reached out to Jyan Isaac, and he generously invited me to join him in the wee hours of the morning for a first-hand look at how the magic happens.
He greeted me with a firm hand and a friendly smile, and let me know that I could observe anything I wanted. But I quickly realized that wouldn’t be easy without getting in everyone’s way. The place is tiny and seems to exist as an afterthought to the adjacent pizza restaurant. There is no actual sales floor. Baked goods are handed out through an open door, across a wooden table to the waiting customers lined up on the sidewalk outside. But that wouldn’t happen until 7 AM.
For the moment, his team, consisting of seven full-time employed bakers, seemed to be executing a perfectly rehearsed and choreographed routine. Drawing from packed floor-to-ceiling shelving, large bags of flour, countless stacks of bins on wheels, gigantic dough mixers, all arranged, put to use, cleaned, stacked, greased, and refilled, the crew’s movements are all orchestrated to serve a process that feeds the dough in various shapes and forms into the giant imported Italian gas deck oven at the center of it all, for golden and dark baked loaves to emerge hot and perfectly timed. I felt witness to a sacred ritual, all seemingly flowing from the mind of the young bread protégé. No commands shouted. No idle chit-chat. World beats blasting. And everybody seemed into it.
“For the moment, his team, consisting of seven full-time employed bakers, seemed to be executing a perfectly rehearsed and choreographed routine.”
Many may be familiar with Jyan Isaac’s story of turning his pandemic-related loss of employment from Gjusta in Venice into a thriving and growing business, one loaf and one half dozen bagels at a time. Initially out of the aforementioned pizzeria that was also shuttered, delivering warm loaves to family, friends, and neighbors, until eventually finding investors to build out the current operation, and soon – the move to a brand new, larger location in Culver City. With more space and upgraded equipment, he estimates to be quadrupling his capacity while maintaining the same unwavering commitment to quality.
By about 8 AM, all the goods were baked, and the dough for the next batch would be ready and formed by noon, then left to do its thing overnight. Jyan took some time out to sit down with me and answer a few questions.
Before he was a baker, he was passionate about music, he tells me. He was a Jazz drummer. He draws clear parallels between baking and playing Jazz. “There is so much creativity with Jazz because it’s all improvised. It’s the same with bread. The bread that I make is based on tradition, improvisation, and creativity. Both are practices and take much patience and discipline,” he says. “They are both physical pursuits, very tactile.” It made me realize that with Jazz as well as with baking, mind, memory, and intuition guide the hands’ actions and movements in service of a higher purpose.
Baking for Jyan, he says, started when he first walked into Tartine bakery on a trip to San Francisco and tasted the sourdough bread by famed baker Chad Robertson. He was hooked then and there. Experimenting at home initially, and eventually pursuing baking full time. He was lucky to find employment at Gjusta where the Venice native loved to immerse himself in the entirety of the experience. He found a great mentor in Travis Lett, the acclaimed Chef, who would leave shortly before the pandemic forced the operation to close its doors in 2020.
When asked what advice he wishes he could have given himself before embarking on this journey, he doesn’t hesitate: “When someone talks to you about wanting to start a business backing your idea, and wants you to be partners, get an agreement in writing before sharing all your knowledge and tools of the trade with them.” Apparently, he had to learn the hard way. Visibly still bothered, he points towards the bagel shop literally next door. Incredulously and somewhat clumsily, I deflect his answer, suggesting he should find comfort in knowing to be the real deal, and that time will inevitably separate the wheat from the chaff.
As to how he balances life and work, he somewhat unsurprisingly insists that there really isn’t that much separation between the two. He likes spending time with his girlfriend, trying out new restaurants, feels at home along the southern California coast, and loves to fly planes out of Santa Monica airport. His real commitment, he maintains, is to the business and the people he employs. “These guys know everything about me. I don’t hold back. They mean everything to me. I’m still amazed sometimes that I get to be surrounded by all these good people and that I can help them make a living, support their families.”
Perhaps more surprising was Jyan’s answer when I asked him what the bravest thing was that he had done in his young life. Half expecting his biggest bravery would be related to his current business venture, I was equal parts surprised and impressed when he confided that the bravest thing he had done was to look within. “Until about a year ago, I had never allowed myself to truly access my feelings, to talk about them. I kept everything bottled up inside,” he shared. He started daring to ask deeper questions about himself, his fears, his motivations, past trauma, about behaviors and habits that didn’t serve him any longer. He decided to undergo a series of frequent and intense psychotherapy sessions over the past year. “It has been incredibly healing. I’m opening up and talking about my life, and understanding who I am. It’s been a really big year for me.”
As I was packing up to leave, I realized that I felt strangely more grounded. It’s the rare encounter with someone like Jyan that reminds us of all the good things that can come from paying more attention to the moment.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY TIM AKUNAS