Not content to keep herself busy running a successful seafront Guest House in Sedgefield, multi talented teacher, writer, poet and seamstress Vanessa Myburgh decided to try her hand at the art of baking her own special brand of sourdough bread.
Baking bread in itself is an art but sourdough bread, now that’s another challenge entirely. It takes planning, patience and lots and lots of practice.
Vanessa being a lover of all things French decided to name her sourdough bread Papillon, which means butterfly in French.
Vanessa’s name has a special connection to a butterfly. It was invented by writer Jonathan Swift for his lover Esther Vanhomrigh in 1713 and was formed by taking “Van” from Vanhomrigh’s last name and adding “Essa”, a pet form of Esther.
The name appeared in Swift’s poem Cadenus and Vanessa for the first time in 1726 and was adopted as the name of a genus of butterfly by Johan Christian Fabricius in 1807 hence the butterfly connection.
I can attest to the yummy chewiness and wholesome goodness of a freshly baked loaf of Papillon sourdough bread.
Vanessa commissioned dedicated bread bags for her fabulous bread.
“Breadmaking is one of those almost hypnotic businesses, like a dance from some ancient ceremony. It leaves you filled with one of the world’s sweetest smells… there is no chiropractic treatment, no Yoga exercise, no hour of meditation in a music-throbbing chapel. that will leave you emptier of bad thoughts than this homely ceremony of making bread.” ― M.F.K. Fisher, The Art of Eating
About the photographer
Moira is a Lifestyle Photographer based in Sedgefield, South Africa.
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