Look at how far we've come. We've learned to watch the dough, not the clock. We've worked on shaping and scoring. We've handled wet dough and figured out how to manage it without panicking. We've built our first preferments and seen what a poolish can do. Now we're going to take everything you've learned and build on it. This week we're baking the pretzel loaf. Two tracks. Same loaf. Yeasted with a poolish if you don't have an active starter, or sourdough if you do. Same hydration, same flour weight, same bath, same bake. Just two different ways to get the dough started. Here's what we're adding to your toolkit this week. The alkaline bath. Most home bakers have never used one. It's the step that turns a regular loaf into a pretzel loaf. Three things happen in that bath, and once you understand the why, you'll never look at a pretzel the same way again. Scoring an alkalized crust. The bath seals the surface tight, which means your score has to do real work. We'll get into where to place it and how deep to go. Reading the bake. The five-minute butter rule. What success looks like when you cut into the crumb. The three most common mistakes and how to fix them before they happen. Here's the thing about doing this together that you can't replicate baking alone in your kitchen. When you bake on your own, you only see your loaf. You don't know if your bulk fermentation went too long or too short until you've cut into it. You don't know what underproofed looks like at hour four versus hour six. You don't know if your bath was strong enough until the loaf comes out pale and you're not sure why. In a bake-along, you're seeing dozens of doughs at every stage at the same time. Someone's hours ahead of you. Someone's hours behind. Someone's about to make the same mistake you almost made yesterday, and you can warn them. Someone else figured something out you didn't, and now you know it too. You get exposed to bread you might never have tried on your own. The pretzel loaf is a perfect example. How many of you would've boiled a bread dough in alkaline water if you weren't doing it as a community? Probably not many. But you'll do it this Saturday, and your kitchen's going to smell like something it's never smelled before.

I talk about you guys every chance I get. The thing is I completely forgot about this interview until he was on my screen asking me to test my microphone. I just come back from the dentist and I had not shaved, but we’re soldiers aren’t we as bakers so I followed it through. https://www.skool.com/content-revenue-lab-4761/this-guy-grew-his-skool-community-faster-than-almost-anyone-else-on-the-platform-video-tomorrow?p=dd36cd69

A lot of you came from Facebook. I run Baking Great Bread at Home over there, 40,000+ members, and I love that community. But I want to be honest about something. On Facebook, you often get one of two things: criticism without substance or compliments without critique. Someone posts a loaf and the comments are either "Beautiful!" when there's clearly something going on, or unhelpful jabs that don't teach you anything. People mean well. They're trying to be kind. But kindness without honesty doesn't make you a better baker. This is a different place. Crust & Crumb Academy is exactly that: an academy. This is where you come to hone your skills and get better. That means when you ask for feedback, you're going to get it. Real feedback. Specific feedback. The kind that actually helps you improve. I'll always be kind. I'll always be encouraging. But you're not going to get empty platitudes from me. If I see something in your crumb, your shaping, your scoring, I'm going to tell you what it is and how to fix it. That's what coaches do. And I want you to do the same for each other. When someone posts a bake and asks for critique, give them something useful. Tell them what you see. Ask questions. Share what's worked for you. That's how we all get better. This is a teaching environment. We're not here to collect compliments. We're here to make better bakers. Perfection is not required. But growth is the goal. Let's get to work. ~Henry

A week ago I shared a personal post here about Ryan's road to NCAA Nationals. I want to take a moment today, while a lot of you are in the house, to thank every single one of you who reached out, donated, shared, or sent a quiet "rooting for him." It meant more than I can put into a short post. This community continues to surprise me in the best way. A few new chapters since that first post. This past Monday at FMU's 56th Annual Athletic Gala, Ryan was named Men's Outdoor Track and Field Most Valuable Player for the third year in a row (2024, 2025, 2026). Out of 17 sports and dozens of MVP awards across the department, only four athletes earned a repeat MVP this year. Ryan was one of them. Quiet kid, loud résumé. Last weekend at the Conference Carolinas Championships, he won his third conference title in the javelin. He holds six school records at FMU and currently sits among the top javelin throwers in NCAA Division II. In three weeks he competes at the NCAA Division II National Championships at Welch Stadium in Emporia, Kansas. Two weeks after that, he receives his master's degree. The NCAA is covering Ryan's trip. I'm covering mine. I'd like to be in the stands. For those who've asked how to follow along or help: - Ryan's story page (with recognition for the businesses who've stepped up): https://faith-field-flow.lovable.app - The GoFundMe is still active for parent travel: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-cheer-ryan-at-ncaa-nationals Sharing helps as much as giving. And honestly, just knowing you're cheering with us means a lot. Back to baguettes. — Henry ⭐🔥

A few days ago I sat down with @Des Dreckett of Content Revenue Lab for a podcast interview about how we built Crust & Crumb Academy. Des runs one of the sharpest community-building Skools on the platform, based out of England. He posted a teaser in his group this morning ahead of the full video dropping. I wanted to share it here because the question he kept coming back to is the one I get asked most often: how is Crust & Crumb growing the way it is, and what are we actually doing differently? My answer is always the same. It starts with the people. The tools, the content, the work, all of it sits on top of that. Strip out the members and there's no community to build. I'll post the full interview here the moment it drops. In the meantime, if community building is something you think about, go say hello to Des and tell him where you're from. He's good people. 👉 https://www.skool.com/content-revenue-lab-4761 ~ Henry ⭐🔥 ---------------------------------------------------- This guy grew his Skool community faster than almost anyone else on the platform - video tomorrow I've just finished interviewing one of the fastest-growing community owners on Skool and I'm still in the edit suite putting the final touches on the video. It drops tomorrow. Here's a snippet to give you a taste of what's coming. Henry built Crust and Crumb Academy into a powerhouse community and the way he thinks about using social media to drive growth is something every community builder needs to hear. This is the kind of conversation that genuinely changes how you approach things. Watch the clip, then come back tomorrow for the full video. In the meantime, you can check out Henry's community here: https://www.skool.com/crust-crumb-academy-7621/about?ref=c75adaa832e449d8b1ef463c22b1d8a9