The weather is very important to Anthony Ali. It tells him how to mix the dough for the Cuban bread at La Segunda Central Bakery in Ybor City, where they have been making bread the same way for nearly 110 years.
“The weather always interferes with the process. You’ve got to adjust to the weather,’’ he says. “It just rained, so it’s a little more humidity right now. The sun’s coming out, starts steaming. You might want to take a little bit of water out of the dough than you normally would put. Little factors like that. If it’s cold, you want to add more water, because it will dry up the crust.’’
It’s something the bakers learn to judge by experience, and Ali, a master baker, has been there for 26 years.
He and co-worker Orlando Rodriguez, hands moving fast, shape tubular rolls of dough into loaves. They move the finished rack forward, where Rodo Ortiz and Terrick Ransom place a palmetto leaf down the middle, turn the loaf over and press the leaf into it. Then the loaves go to the next station for prep and baking. The leaf scores the bread, allowing expanding gases to form the loaf.
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Philip MorganMaster baker Anthony Ali has been at La Segunda for 26 years.“The leaf gives it that crevice, and without that crevice, it comes out looking like a baseball bat. It makes it open up like a flower,’’ Ali says.
Their large workspace has fans but isn’t air-conditioned. They’ve been doing it that way since the beginning, says Copeland More, fourth-generation owner of La Segunda, and they don’t want to change it “because it works.’’
A Tampa institution
The central bakery in Ybor turns out 18,000 to 22,000 loaves of bread a day, he says. Three shifts of bakers provide 24-hour coverage six days a week. More says about 500 restaurants in the Tampa Bay area serve La Segunda Cuban bread. That includes the Columbia, their oldest and largest customer, La Teresita, Carmine’s and Wright’s Gourmet House. La Segunda has three outlets beyond the central bakery; two in Tampa and one in St. Petersburg. Many loaves are frozen, boxed and trucked to restaurants throughout the country.
La Segunda’s Cuban bread is known for its thin flaky crust, which the bakers achieve by blowing fans directly on the loaves for 10 to 15 minutes – depending on the weather outside – before putting them in the oven, More says.
The crust distinguishes La Segunda’s bread from the Cuban bread made in Miami. More says the Miami style is more like the consistency of a hoagie roll. La Segunda sells little bread in Miami, More says, because the culture there likes their bread “and we like our bread.’’
La Segunda expanded in the mid-1990s because the Columbia Restaurant expanded. Columbia leaders asked More’s father and uncle if La Segunda could make deliveries to its other restaurant locations in Florida. Soon, other restaurants wanted the bread. Beef O’Brady’s eventually required all its franchisees to carry La Segunda Cuban bread, so it expanded throughout the country.
At mid-morning in the retail bakery, located at the front of the Cuban bread bakery, a crowd lines up to place their orders to employees who wear T-shirts declaring, “We Bake History Every Single Day.’’ Customers can buy cookies and pastries, including guava turnovers, a variety of sandwiches and more.
Customer Eric Tirado walks back to his car with a bag of goodies. He makes the 30- to 40-minute drive from northwest Tampa about five days a week. He likes everything they bake, he says.
“And I’m diabetic. That’s what makes it worse,’’ he adds, with a smile that says what-are-you-gonna-do? “Everybody knows, the enemy is your eyes and your taste buds.’’
Deep Spanish, Cuban roots
It all began with Juan Moré of Spain. According to the family story, Moré went to Cuba as a soldier in the Spanish-American War and stayed after the war ended. In Cuba, he reportedly acquired the bread recipe and, in 1915, opened the bakery in Ybor City. He and his partners established three bakeries, called El Primero, La Segunda and El Tercero (The First, The Second and The Third). El Primero and El Tercero went out of business, leaving La Segunda. Moré bought his partners out.
“No one is 100 percent sure that the recipe came from Cuba,’’ More says. “Some of our family thinks it actually is a family recipe from Spain. So they think he had the recipe, he went to Cuba, he saw how they made bread and used the palmetto leaf, and started using the palmetto leaf with that bread when he came to Tampa.’’
Juan Moré’s sons, Ricardo, Raymond and Anthony, were the second-generation owners. Cousins Raymond and Anthony were the third generation. Copeland More is Anthony’s son. His father died last year at age 80.
More believes it was his grandfather who dropped the accent mark from the name, Americanizing the pronunciation. As a young child, Copeland More would help in the bakery during holidays, packing cookies or bread, he recalls.
“I mainly just ran around and caused trouble.’’
On summer and winter breaks from high school, he delivered bread to the Columbia, Carmine’s and the rest of the Ybor City route. When he came home from college, he would help with the books and data entry. He graduated from Miami University with a degree in finance.
He remembers his father and Uncle Raymond at work.
“I think they had a good working relationship because my dad liked to work with the product and bake bread, and Raymond liked the business side of things and dealing with the people,’’ More says.
But the 50-50 partnership created problems, he notes, calling the structure a “nightmare.’’
“It doesn’t work anywhere because somebody has to make a decision and be responsible for that decision, and if you have two people to make one decision, it doesn’t make any sense,” he says.
While there was contention at times, More says, “they worked together for 30-something years. There was a lot of economic difficulty in the ’70s and the ’80s that they pushed through.’’
In the bread bakery, Ralph Patrinostro has come to visit. He is retired after 24 years
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Philip MorganRalph Patrinostro is retired after 24 years at La Segunda and comes by about once a week to visit. as a baker at La Segunda and comes by about once a week to see his friends.
“We always had fun here,’’ he says. “It was almost like a family group, you know. I taught almost everybody in here.’’
They do have fun, Ali says, all while turning out the product Tampa and the country are accustomed to biting into.
“We take a lot of pride,’’ he says. “Pride, history, tradition, love.’’
For more information, go to La Segunda