THE CROISSANT KERFLUFFLE

Whenever Neil feels like he’s losing business, he takes it out on the croissants. It doesn’t matter how busy we may be, the measure by which the customers judge The Shop are the croissants.
It is a point well taken to a certain degree. Stu almost never leaves the shop without commenting on the ham and cheese croissants. Only Stu doesn’t call them croissants, he calls them, crescents. I’m not sure which is more annoying, his running commentary, or his pronunciation.
“Who made the crescents yesterday? They were burnt?” he’ll complain, or, “Nice crescents,” like he’s commenting on your ass. He’s stopped Neil on the street to voice is opinion on the topic. Usually he just complains to me. Luckily, he likes how I bake my croissants, but I still don’t like hearing him complain about my co-workers. It’s not easy getting to work at four-thirty in the morning. Croissants are the last things on anyone’s mind.
We get our croissants frozen. The night staff leaves them out overnight to thaw, and then the opener comes in, gives them an eggwash and throws them in the oven to bake while panning the muffins. You aim for a nice golden brown, but you can’t start the scones until the muffin pans are in the oven, so you make a few compromises for the sake of expediency.
I was watching the diving finals of the Olympics when Neil’s wife, Abbey called. Abbey is Den Mother of the shop, and is usually the bearer of bad news. She has a soft touch.
“I need to have a croissant conversation.”
The cute Canadian, Alexandre Despatie, had just stepped up to the board. I don’t know which excited me more: the potential of a gold medal or his bathing suit.
“You know how you guys make the croissants first thing in the morning? Well, Neil wants you to bake them last when the oven is hot. They cook faster, and look better when they’re done.”
Alex blew the dive.
“Shit!” I said into the phone.
“What?”
“Sorry! I’m watching diving. Sure. Anything. I’ll do it like he wants.” Then got off the phone to get back to diving.
I make a concerted effort to follow instructions even though it’s just a Joe-Job that just barely pays the bills. The next morning I went, and let the empty oven warm up while I panned the muffins. It threw my day off a good half hour. The croissants were just going to into the oven when people started ordering breakfast. It was a struggle microwaving eggs and keeping an eye on the croissants so they didn’t go up in smoke. I spent the rest of my shift trying to catch up.
The next time I worked with her Peggy asked, “So what do you think about this whole croissant thing?”
“Personally, I don’t see the difference.”
“Me neither.”
Neither had Matilda, the other opener.
The three of us spent the next couple of weeks worrying about how our croissants looked. No one commented on them one way or the other. I give it six months before it becomes a bone of contention again.

GarpinBC