Eduard Crespo

In Oc­to­ber 1908, Manuel Cre­spo and his wife Blasa set up the Fleca Balmes bak­ery, which we see fea­tured in the image. In those days, the train line in Sarrià was still above ground. Very quickly, Manuel be­came known in the local neigh­bour­hood as the “King of Ensaïmades”.

Today, the bak­ery is run by the founders' grand­son, Ed­uard Cre­spo, who grew up among sacks of flour, ovens and freshly-baked loaves. How­ever, it was not until 1972, with his oblig­a­tory mil­i­tary ser­vice be­hind him, that Ed­uard took over the bak­ery, after learn­ing all the se­crets of the trade from his fa­ther Manuel.

Over time, Ed­uard has de­vel­oped new types of bread with dif­fer­ent ce­re­als and flavours that still nev­er­the­less re­spect the basic rules of the trade he was taught, as well the level of qual­ity es­tab­lished by his grand­fa­ther and fa­ther.

Fleca Balmes is con­sid­ered one of Barcelona's best bak­eries and has won a num­ber of prizes and awards, in­clud­ing in­ter­na­tional recog­ni­tion.

Ed­uard's daugh­ter, Giorgina, helps him the shop and is the fourth gen­er­a­tion in the fam­ily bak­ing busi­ness. In many ways, things have not changed since 1908, as the baked prod­ucts con­tinue to be made with care and at­ten­tion, using long fer­men­ta­tion. The bak­ery pro­duces its own nat­ural dough, which is newly-made every day to en­sure last­ing bread that is tasty, nicely-coloured, and with a great aroma.

1. Wooden peel with a long han­dle. The length of the han­dle de­pends on the depth of the oven. The end of the peel is thin­ner than the rest so it can be slid under the baked bread to re­move it.

2. Fer­men­ta­tion bas­kets. Also known as ban­netons in Cata­lan, they are used above all for nat­ural doughs. They help the bread keep its shape dur­ing fer­men­ta­tion be­fore it goes into the oven.

3. Flour scoop. This tool is used to ma­nip­u­late the flour.

4. Bread slicer, or guil­lo­tine. Not so many years ago it was a tool to be found in every bak­ery. Today, a ma­chine is used to slice loaves.

5. Farm­house loaf (Pa rodó de pagès). The clas­sic loaf seen in tra­di­tional Cata­lan cui­sine and per­fect for mak­ing tomato bread (pa amb tomàquet).

6. Loaf. These long loaves are made with flour milled with French stone, high hy­dra­tion and long fer­men­ta­tion.

7. Spelt bread. This bread made from spelt, or dinkel wheat, is 100% or­ganic.

8. Till. This has been part of the shop for over half a cen­tury. Today, it is only used as dec­o­ra­tion.

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