Nothing much happens: bedtime stories to help you sleep - Snowfall at the Bakery

Episode Date: February 13, 2023

Our story tonight is called Snowfall at the Bakery and it’s a story about the reappearance of winter after a few weeks of mild weather. It’s also about hot chocolate made with care, schoolchildren... let out early, and the prospect of snowmen in the park.We give to a different charity each week and this week we are giving to National Alliance to End Homelessness at endhomelessness.org They are committed to preventing and ending homelessness in the United States.”Purchase Our Book: https://bit.ly/Nothing-Much-HappensSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to Bedtime Stories for Everyone, in which nothing much happens. You feel good, and then you fall asleep. I'm Katherine Nicolai. I read and write all the stories you hear on Nothing Much Happens, with audio engineering by Bob Wittersheim. Listeners all over the world frequently tell me they wish they could listen to my stories in their own language, and I'll have some more updates about that soon. But for now, I want to let you know that my audiobook, also called Nothing Much Happens, is already available in many, many languages.
Starting point is 00:00:50 Just search wherever you listen. We give to a different charity each week at Nothing Much Happens, and this week we are giving to the National Alliance to End Homelessness at endhomelessness.org. They are committed to preventing and ending homelessness in the United States. Now, your work for the day is done. Let me take over from here. I'll read you a story, and as you listen, your thinking mind will be engaged and unable to wander. Your brain activity will shift from default mode to task mode, and that is the great secret to falling and returning to sleep. I'll read the story twice, and I'll go a little bit slower the second time through.
Starting point is 00:01:54 If you find yourself awake again in the night, think back through any parts you can remember, or restart the story. But please, don't waste time wondering if you should just press play and you'll sleep again lights out devices down pull the comforter up over your shoulder, and notice how good it is to be safe and in your bed. I'll be here, watching over, even after you've fallen asleep. All is well. Take a slow, deep breath in through your nose. And sigh through your mouth.
Starting point is 00:02:55 One more time. Breathe in. And let it out. Good. Our story tonight is called Snowfall at the Bakery, and it's a story about the reappearance of winter after a few weeks of mild weather. It's also about hot chocolate made with care.
Starting point is 00:03:30 Schoolchildren let out early and the prospect of snowmen in the park. Snowfall at the bakery. It had been a few weeks now that we'd had no snow. And honestly, I hadn't missed it yet. It was kind of lovely
Starting point is 00:04:03 to walk through town on dry sidewalks and leave the house in my sneakers rather than my tall heavy boots. In the evenings, there would be a faint scent of spring in the air. Not that I believed it. It was fool's spring, and I knew it. There was plenty of winter still to come, but it smelled lovely. That rich, dark earth scent. The aroma of rain and soil. It felt like a sneak preview of something that, while it wasn't coming very soon, would come again. And would feel fresh and revitalizing when it arrived.
Starting point is 00:05:18 So when it started to snow today, well, it took my breath away. I'd forgotten just how beautiful our little downtown was when it was covered in a blanket of white. It had started just as the breakfast rush was clearing out at the bakery. I'd been wiping down tables and restarting the coffee for the third time today. When I looked out through the front windows of the shop and saw flakes falling. They were coming down so thick and fast that it looked like a movie, and I imagined a crew of folks up above somewhere hearing the cue to start the snow and turning the
Starting point is 00:06:31 machine to high. People on the street were stunned as well. I saw them stop to look up, put out their gloved hands to catch snowflakes, and smile as they went back on their way. Each customer who came in mentioned it. It's really coming down, we said to each other. "'We're set to get five inches by the end of the day,' called someone from the back of the line. "'Wow,' we all said, and turned to look out at the street again. I decided to slip into the kitchen and set up another tray of donuts.
Starting point is 00:07:41 I had a feeling that people would need something hot and sweet to go with this snowy day. I washed my hands at the sink and put a fresh apron on. Most of our baking happened pretty early each morning. By the time we flipped the open sign in the window, we had fresh donuts and bagels and pastries in the display case, ready for our customers. Then, while the morning rush was carrying on out front, we baked things that tended to sell later in the day.
Starting point is 00:08:28 Bread, rolls, pies and cakes. By this point in the day, unless we had a special order, we didn't have much left to do in the kitchen, and that was my favorite time to be back here. It's when I could experiment a bit, test recipes I was working on, and bake with no sense of urgency.
Starting point is 00:09:08 So I cut out donuts and fried them off in batches. I tossed them in cinnamon and sugar and carried them out on a tray to slide into the cabinet beside the cash register. Now the snow lay at least an inch or two deep all over the sidewalks and benches and tree branches. I wiped my hands on a towel and stepped over to the window.
Starting point is 00:09:47 We had a little neon sign that I turned on when the donuts were hot, and I plugged it in and watched the light of it reflect in the snow outside. Across the street at the diner, they were already shoveling the sidewalks, and their windows were fogged up from the cold. A customer came in and stomped the snow from his shoes at the front door. He rubbed his hands together and breathed over them. Donuts are hot, I said. I saw, he said with a laugh in his voice. I just heard that they are closing the schools
Starting point is 00:10:45 before we get too much more. You should have a bunch of little ones in here needing hot chocolate in a few minutes. I'll get ready then. Thanks, I said, and headed back to the kitchen. We made excellent hot chocolate, and it didn't come from a pouch of powder and some scalding water either.
Starting point is 00:11:23 I made it with ground cacao and shaved chocolate and creamy oat milk and cinnamon. My secret ingredient was a bit of tahini, and it gave the drink a richness that my customers craved but could never quite identify. In the kitchen, I heated the milk and whisked in all the ingredients. With a long-handled ladle,
Starting point is 00:11:58 I lifted cupfuls of the cocoa a foot into the air and let it fall back into the pot which frothed it as it warmed. Finally, I poured it all into an urn and just as I was carrying it carefully to the counter, the bell over the door began to ring again and again. School had indeed been cancelled for the afternoon,
Starting point is 00:12:38 and kids were streaming in excitedly, dressed in snowsuits, with mittens dangling from the sleeves of their coat. We sold cup after cup of hot chocolate, topped with mini marshmallows, as well as all of the donuts, plus about half of the cookies. I chatted with the kids as I passed out the treats and filled their cups. They'd watched the snow coming down from inside their big brick schoolhouse
Starting point is 00:13:19 a few blocks over and hoped and wished that it would just keep on falling. Over lunch, rumors flew as fast as the snow, that there was a blizzard coming, the biggest in a hundred years, that they'd get snowed in at the school and have to sleep on gymnastic mats in the cafeteria and survive on beans for days. When they got bundled up for recess, the announcement had come over the loudspeaker that school was closing, and everyone, even the teachers, had cheered.
Starting point is 00:14:19 Some kids were riding the bus, and some getting picked up by their parents. But for the ones who walked to school, well, they felt they had the best luck of all. They were here for their emergency rations, cocoa and donuts, and whatever else their pocket money could afford. And then they were off to the park to roll the heavy, wet snow into giant balls and stack them three high to build an army of snowmen.
Starting point is 00:15:05 As they tromped off with their cups and cookies, I watched from the window, glad that the winter was here to remind us how to play. Snowfall at the bakery. It had been a few weeks now that we'd had no snow. And honestly,
Starting point is 00:15:42 I hadn't missed it yet. It was kind of lovely to walk through town on dry sidewalks and leave the house in my sneakers rather than my tall, heavy boots. In the evenings, there would be a faint scent of spring in the air. Not that I believed it. It was full spring, and I knew it. There was plenty of winter still to come. But it smelled lovely.
Starting point is 00:16:40 The rich, dark earth scent, the aroma of rain and soil. I felt like a sneak preview of something that while it wasn't coming very soon, would come again and would feel fresh and revitalizing when it arrived. So, when it started to snow today, well, it took my breath away. I'd forgotten just how beautiful our little downtown was when it was covered in a blanket of white. It had started just as the breakfast rush was clearing out at the bakery. I'd been wiping down tables and restarting the coffee for the third time today. When I looked out through the front windows of the shop,
Starting point is 00:18:17 and saw flakes falling, they were coming down so thick and fast that it looked like a movie, and I imagined a crew of folks up above somewhere, hearing the cue to start the snow and turning the machine to high. People on the street were stunned as well. I saw them stop to look up, put out their gloved hands to catch snowflakes and smile as they went back on their way. Each customer who came in mentioned it it's really coming down
Starting point is 00:19:33 we said to each other we're set to get five inches by the end of the day called someone from the back of the line. Wow, we all said, and turned to look out at the street again. I decided to slip into the kitchen and set up another tray of donuts. I had a feeling that people would need something hot and sweet to go with this snowy day. I washed my hands in the sink and put a fresh apron on. Most of our baking happened pretty early each morning.
Starting point is 00:20:40 By the time we flipped the open sign in the window, we had fresh donuts and bagels and past baked things that tended to sell later in the day. Bread, rolls, pies, and cakes. By this point in the day, unless we had a special order, we didn't have much left to do. And that was my favorite time to be in the kitchen. It's when I could experiment a bit, test recipes I was working on, and bake with no sense of urgency. So I cut out doughnuts and fried them off in batches, tossed them in cinnamon and sugar, and carried them on a tray to slide into the cabinet beside the cash register. Now the snow lay at least an inch or two deep
Starting point is 00:22:35 all over the sidewalks and benches and tree branches. I wiped my hands on a towel and stepped over to the window. We had a little neon sign that I turned on when the donuts were hot, and I plugged it in and watched the light of it reflect in the snow outside.
Starting point is 00:23:17 Across the street at the diner, they were already shoveling the sidewalks, and their windows were fogged up from the cold. A customer came in and stomped the snow from his shoes at the front door. He rubbed his hands together and breathed over them. The donuts are hot, I said. I saw, he said with a laugh. I just heard that they are closing the schools before we get too much more. You should have a bunch of little ones in here, needing hot chocolate in a few minutes. I'll get ready then thanks I said and headed back to the kitchen
Starting point is 00:24:29 we make excellent hot chocolate and it didn't come from a pouch of powder and some scalding water either I made it with ground cacao and shaved chocolate and creamy oat milk and cinnamon. My secret ingredient was a bit of tahini, and it gave the drink a richness that my customers craved, but could never quite identify. In the kitchen, I heated the milk and whisked in all the ingredients. With a long-handled ladle, I lifted cupfuls of the cocoa a foot into the air and let it fall back into the pot, which frothed it as it warmed.
Starting point is 00:25:49 Finally, I poured it into an urn, and just as I was carrying it carefully to the counter, the bell over the door began to ring again and again. School had indeed been cancelled for the afternoon, and kids were streaming in excitedly, dressed in snowsuits, with mittens dangling from the sleeves of their coats. topped with mini marshmallows, as well as all of the donuts, plus about half of the cookies. I chatted with the kids as I passed out the treats and filled their cups. They'd watched the snow coming down from inside their big brick schoolhouse a few blocks over and hoped and wished that it would just keep on falling.
Starting point is 00:27:28 Over lunch, rumors flew as fast as the snow that there was a blizzard coming, the biggest in a hundred years, that they'd get snowed in at the school and have to sleep on gymnastic mats in the cafeteria and surviveled up for recess. The announcement had come over the loudspeaker that school was closing, and everyone, even the teachers, had cheered.
Starting point is 00:28:24 Some kids were riding the bus. the teachers had cheered. Some kids were riding the bus and some getting picked up by parents. But for these kids who walked to school, well, they felt they had the best luck of all. They were here for their emergency rations, cocoa and donuts, and whatever else their pocket money could afford.
Starting point is 00:29:12 And then they were off to the park to roll the heavy, wet snow into giant balls and stack them three high to build an army of snowmen. As they tromped off with their cups and cookies, I watched from the window, glad that the winter was here to remind
Starting point is 00:29:40 us how to play. Sweet dreams.

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