The Speakeasy Bakery If you know, you know.

By the time word spread, hundreds of people wanted a slice of the action.
It started with word-of-mouth — whispers rippling through social media circles.  At first you needed to know someone who knew someone.  Handshakes and goods were exchanged at prearranged meet-ups.  Slowly it evolved.  Later you had to be in the right place at the right time.  Or you needed a password.  Another time, you just had to know what you were looking for.  Now, you better speak quickly.
So where is Speakeasy Bakery?  If you know, you know.  There really is no other way to find it.
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“The seeds of Speakeasy Bakery grew out of SCV Foodies,” said Head Baker Scott Ervin of the bakery’s beginnings in a popular Facebook group.
Someone needed a pie, and word on the street was: Scott Ervin makes a pretty mean one.  Based off a social media recommendation, Scott was solicited for a pie, to which he was happy to oblige, and offered to bring it to the curb.
“What are you running some kind of speakeasy?” Scott recalled of his first recipient’s reply.  “So, of course, within five minutes I set up a Facebook page called The Speakeasy Bakery and invited one person, as a joke.”
It was pie that started it, but the sourdough kept ‘em coming.  Scott had been baking the same sourdough recipe for 10-15 years, and it was time to spice things up.
“I wanted to explore different types of sourdough, and I started baking bread like crazy,” Scott said.  “We had more bread than we could possibly eat, so I put it on Facebook.”
The first to request loaves would get their name on a list, and Scott would hand deliver.
“I would meet people in public places and give them a loaf of bread,” Scott said.  “It just sort of became this speakeasy bakery.  If you knew, you knew.”
Eventually, Scott couldn’t keep up with demand.  One batch was even spoken for within 53 seconds – right down to the last morsel.
“A lot of what The Speakeasy Bakery is has come from a joke here or a comment there,” Scott said, who partners with Todd Wilson to lead Speakeasy Bakery.
Along the way, someone mentioned a class.  Shortly after, a commercial kitchen was booked, a three-hour hands-on demonstration commenced, and a small army of local bakers was born.
“That spawned a series of classes, and soon we had a lot of local people learning to make bread,” Scott said.
As spontaneously as the rest of its history, The Speakeasy Bakery got a taste of its own charitable powers on March 14, 2015.  For National Pi Day last year, The Speakeasy Bakery social community responded to a request and baked apple pies for an auction, raising $1,500 in 2015 and $3,000 in 2016 for a local non-profit.
“Now we call that the Empire Apple Pie because it’s the pie that started the empire,” Scott said with a chuckle.
Next, the bakery was invited to the first-ever Los Angeles Bread Festival at Grand Central Market in downtown; they needed a lot of bread – and fast.
“A whole lot of people who had taken the classes baked 80 loaves for each of the two nights,” Scott said.  “We sold out in less than three hours each day.  People were going crazy for the bread.  We were just flabbergasted.”
Proceeds from festival sales also were donated to a local charity.  Since then, The Speakeasy Bakery has participated in local charity events, such as Assistance League’s Sunset in the Vineyard, and held multiple bake sales for charity.
And all of this is made possible by a community of people bonded by a love of bread and its ability to serve others.  Today the Facebook group has amassed more than 1,000 members.
“This whole thing has been sort of a fairytale to me,” Scott said.  “We’ve got a whole lot of people who are willing to pitch in and show up, and the bread people are baking locally is really some of the best bread I’ve tasted.  We’ve got some legs here.”
So when will The Speakeasy Bakery open up a storefront?
If you know, you know.  Until then, we’ll just have to wait and see what they do next.
For more information about Speakeasy Bakery, please visit www.thespeakeasybakery.com, the closed Facebook group (www.facebook.com/groups/thespeakeasybakery), or the Facebook fan page (www.facebook.com/thespeakeasybakery).

Photos by A. Rios

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