Photos by Elizabeth Anderson
My mom had been bugging me for months about trying the artisan bakery, Fervere. I never had enough time to venture downtown and try it out since it’s only open Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Finally, a Saturday morning with no cross country meet or ACT prep classes opened up enough time for me to give it a try.
On the corner of 17th and Summit, Fervere is in the perfect location for a relaxing Saturday morning outing – buying loaves of bread for the week and pastries from Fervere for breakfast, shopping across the street at Westside Storey for some new KC shirts and then going for a walk downtown in the Crossroads.
At the back of the shop was an oven that seemed to take up almost half of the room. The bakery was rustic and simple, with bread molders displayed on shelves on the brick walls and a bookshelf filled with cookbooks and bear-shaped jars of honey.
According to the cashier, Fervere is known for their Orchard Bread, loaded with apricots, apples and raisins to add to the sweet flavor, with walnuts to balance it out. I helped myself to some samples they had sitting out, knowing that I would have to buy a loaf the next time I visited. It would be perfect toasted with goat cheese, as Fervere recommended, and I could easily see my mom making this as an appetizer for the next time she had her book club over.
Though the Orchard Bread was my favorite, their Cheese Slippers, ciabatta bread smothered with cheddar, garlic and cheese curds, were a close second. It was the first thing I noticed when I walked in, so I knew I would have to try it even though there were no samples of this. I bought a $9 loaf for my family, and just as I expected, my parents and sisters devoured it as soon as I walked inside my house.
After trying the two breads unique to Fervere, I decided to go for a classic loaf of Ciabatta. I brought it home for my family as well, and we ate it with butter and honey and then snacked on it all day. My mom even mentioned that she would pay to have Fervere bread every week if they weren’t so far away.
Surprisingly, the whole bakery was just one small room. I couldn’t imagine how crowded it must get when it first opens at 9:30 a.m. on Saturdays – I was fortunate enough to get there around 1 p.m., after the storm of customers.
Unfortunately, missing the crowd of people also meant missing the pastries Fervere gets from its sister bakery, Ibis, in Lenexa. According to the cashier, they sell out of the pastries earlier in the day. I’m just using this as an excuse to go again next weekend, though.
The overall ambiance of the bakery was natural and homely. Though the bread was more expensive than my usual favorite, Great Harvest light-wheat, I would still make the trip down there every few weeks for the atmosphere and freshly-baked bread.