How 100 years of history led to an underground bakery with a modern take on tradition
More than 100 years ago, Yonatan Kamil’s great-great grandmother opened a Jewish bakery in Russia — the origin of generations of bakers that ripples forward to this day.
After their bakery was seized during the Russian Revolution, the family retreated to Canada. When they arrived, “baker” was stamped as the occupation on their immigration papers, a mark that would imprint Kamil’s identity decades later.
In 1930, Kamil’s great-grandfather opened Rideau Bakery in Ottawa, known for their light rye breads and braided challahs sprinkled with sesame seeds.
Kamil’s career started at the cash register, which led to 4 a.m. pastry shifts and later, six days a week in the bread department.
“I had no life except for the bakery,” Kamil said. “That’s how I really started baking and fell in love with it.”
The bakery was his “guiding light,” but in 2013, Kamil moved to Toronto to build on what he knew. He worked at some of the city’s most notable bakeries, including Brick Street Bakery in Leslieville and Blackbird Baking Co. in Kensington.
In 2019, Kamil’s family bakery in Ottawa, an institution for nearly 90-years, closed its doors. The following year, he was ready to start something entirely of his own.
“It was a dark time in the province,” he said. “We just kind of decided to start selling some bread from home.”
Kamil and his wife, Samantha April, named their underground operation Lev Bakery. In Hebrew, “lev” means heart. “Baking comes from the heart for me,” Kamil said. “It’s so deeply ingrained.” Dually, “lev” also resembles the word leaven, the transformative stage in baking when dough rises.
Lev Bakery launched with an Instagram post, selling a couple challahs, manifesting its mission statement: a modern take on tradition.
Within minutes, they sold out. “We started posting and people started wanting,” April said. “Oh it was crazy,” Kamil added. From there, the growth was organic.
Kamil and April created a system that they sustained for months: on Wednesdays, they opened pre-orders on Instagram along with a weekly menu, which often included a rye, challah and babka, each with their own twist.
On Thursdays, Kamil kneaded and baked through the night, borrowing North of Brooklyn’s industrial kitchen, which a friend owned and lent him.
“More people wanted bread than I could make,” Kamil said. At capacity, he was baking 70 unique orders of bread solo.
Friday was pick-up day. Friends met to grab their orders, parents pushed strollers as an outing for cooped-up kids and neighbours in the Bloor and Lansdowne area who Kamil had never met became regulars at his front door.
Lev Bakery became a weekly ritual at a time when stability was scarce.
But, Kamil and April knew the pandemic predicament was temporary and by the time the weather warmed and restrictions eased, they needed to have a contingency plan already in motion.
By the spring, Kamil started renting a production bakery in Etobicoke where he could bake at a higher volume and expand the Lev Bakery menu, selling to over a dozen small businesses, like Parallel Brothers, Pusateri’s, Ethica Coffee Roasters and Primrose Bagel Co.
While Lev’s business model has evolved, that intimate, initial connection was fundamental to its foundation.
Years ago, Kamil’s family bakery was a guiding light that steered his identity as a baker. Through the dark days of the pandemic, he passed that light on to his customers in the form of bread, embodying the “lev”, or heart, at the core of the bakery’s name.
ABOUT TABLE TALK
Table Talk is a weekly CTV News Toronto series that explores the people who shape Toronto’s food scene, published every Friday at CTVNewsToronto.ca
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
CRA no longer requiring 'bare trust' reporting in 2023 tax return
The Canada Revenue Agency announced Thursday it will not require 'bare trust' reporting from Canadians that it introduced for the 2024 tax season, just four days before the April 2 deadline.
He didn't trust police but sought their help anyway. Two days later, he was dead
Jameek Lowery was among more than 330 Black people who died after police stopped them with tactics that aren’t supposed to be deadly, like physical restraint and use of stun guns, The Associated Press found.
Fluid in eye cells can 'boil' if you watch the eclipse without protection: expert
Millions of people in parts of Eastern and Atlantic Canada will be able to see the rare solar eclipse happening on April 8. But they should only look up if they have proper eye protection, experts say.
NEW More unauthorized products for skin, sexual enhancement, recalled: Here are the recalls of this week
Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency recalled various items this week, including torches, beef biltong and unauthorized products related to skin care and sexual enhancement.
Where is the worst place for allergy sufferers in Canada?
The spring allergy season has started early in many parts of Canada, with high levels of pollen in some cities already. Experts weigh in on which areas have it worse so far this season.
Do these exercises for core strength if you can't stomach doing planks
Planks are one of the most effective exercises for strengthening your midsection, as they target all of your major core muscles: the transverse abdominis, rectus abdominis, external obliques and internal obliques. Yet despite the popularity of various 10-minute plank challenges, planking is actually one of the most dreaded core exercises, according to many fitness experts.
Grandparent scam: London, Ont., senior beats fraudsters not once, but twice
It was a typical Tuesday for Mabel Beharrell, 84, until she got the call that would turn her world upside down. Her teenaged grandson was in trouble and needed her help.
Angst and calls for resting places as Surrey, B.C., pet cemetery development continues
A single headstone is all that remains of dozens of markers for long-buried pets in a subdivision in Surrey’s Newton neighbourhood, where a half-acre parcel bears a large sign announcing the proposed construction of new homes.
Polar ice is melting and changing Earth's rotation. It's messing with time itself
One day in the next couple of years, everyone in the world will lose a second of their time. Exactly when that will happen is being influenced by humans, according to a new study, as melting polar ice alters the Earth’s rotation and changes time itself.