A Greek master baker, one hundred percent semolina.

Red Hook Focacceria is the work of one man: Aristos, a Greek master baker who has spent twenty-five years chasing a single thing. High-hydration, long-fermented dough, made from one hundred percent Italian semolina.

Semolina is a refined flour, wheat ground a certain way that makes it elastic and workable. Real bread comes from it. Most bakeries gave it up, because it asks too much and takes real skill. He never did.

His flour comes straight from one of Italy's great mills, blended to his own specification. He tells the miller the exact protein he wants, and pays many times over what an ordinary bag costs. You can feel the difference before you taste it. His flour is alive.

Rarer than the craft is holding it at volume. Small batch, small everything, and still tray after tray a day, each one right. Pane di Altamura, sesame filone, stecca, and the focaccia the shop is named for. The sesame loaf looks like any other Italian bastone; it is a different thing entirely, because of what it is made from.

For years he baked for other people's counters. Now, on Van Brunt Street, he has his own.

I started getting his bread at my restaurant, then I started going to the source. Early mornings, pulling loaves straight out of the oven, asking questions. It is the best I have eaten, and I have eaten bread every morning for thirty years. We believe in it so much that F&F carries it. One hundred percent semolina, and nobody else is doing it.