In a mere year and a half, Perch Café and Bakery has become a year-round institution here for a welcoming cup of coffee or cappuccino and a warm pastry – all this in a town without a bustling Main Street and a summer population that drops off around October. Perch has succeeded because of the vision and hard work of Lynn Bachelder and her cheerful family and staff. That, and the array of pastries that Lynn sets out at 8AM on five mornings a week (Thursdays-Mondays) right when she opens, all baked hours before, all from scratch. Lynn starts her day at 5 AM. To me, a rank amateur baker, it seems a miracle that she can complete making biscuits, scones, coffee cake, sourdough bagels, gluten-free cakes, chocolate chip cookies, and a daily frittata in only three hours, let alone in one oven. But this is where experience must come in. Lynn has baked all of her adult life. She’s owned cafes and she’s run cafes. She’s managed a small homestead. She’s been a beekeeper and a cheesemaker. And she learned everything on her own. She’s no stranger to hard work or taking risks. Born in Lowell, MA, she’s lived as far west as Ohio and as far east as Rockland, with Cambridge, Newburyport and Portland in the middle. Her deepest love is for her family – her mother and her five children who are mostly in Maine, and being in Waldoboro makes it easy to see them. Being in Waldoboro enables her to walk to work. And being here keeps her close to the ocean to go swimming, even in winter.
The reason I love baking is because I have to slow down, be mindful, and to focus on putting care into what I’m doing. Cooking and baking have always been an expression of love for me. And I do that here.
I do love making biscuits. Maybe it’s the flouring the table. The rolling them out. Biscuits are the first thing I do when I get here in the morning. I don’t follow a recipe per se because, depending on the day, the humidity, the temperature — sometimes two cups of buttermilk isn’t enough. The dough is a little different every day. I have to pay attention to them, be very intentional each time in order for them to come out perfect. Biscuits set my morning.
Then, after they are in the oven, it’s scones. Chocolate chip cookies. Crumb cakes. Gluten-free cakes. Quick breads like banana or pumpkin. The last to go in is the frittata.
Baking has always been a part of my adult life. I was in my early 20s when I taught myself to bake. I was home with babies, and I needed something to do. I had access to a great library. So, I would stroll my babies there, find cookbooks, bring them home, read them all and try the recipes. I made everything from scratch. When I was 24 and just pregnant with my second daughter I began to sell at a local farmer’s market. I would stay up all night and bake, and then I’d sell out by 10:00 in the morning. I had a customer who wanted to open a café, so we did. My daughter was born two months after we opened. She came to work in a basket under the counter. I’ve always been a family-oriented person in terms of home-life and work-life.
It sounds corny but my kids give me joy. Here, I get to spend all day with Eli. I have my daughter and granddaughter living upstairs.
And I love the community that Perch is becoming. That was what I wanted when I started Perch. People having workshops here! Knitting groups. People meeting to play games. I love that someone posted they were at “knitting church.” Yesterday a woman was sitting over there spinning her own yarn from wool. Those things super-fill my cup. I love seeing people enjoy being here and hearing their feedback. It’s rewarding.
We want this to be a welcoming space for everybody. I have a lot of queer family members and people I love. Hanging the flag was a way of saying that we’d stand by them and bring the safety and the space and the love and the light to the queer community as best we can. Everyone is welcome. We want to create community, to be a place where people can be kind to each other regardless.
The flag is not political. It’s just that if you’re part of an under-represented part of the population that feels threatened, you need to know there are places where you’d be safe. I’ve always been an ‘under my wing’ kind of person.
But I knew the flag would be impactful. I knew some folk might not want to come in. And at first, it was a little scary. One day we got a long note taped to the door signed “a neighbor,” but they didn’t say who they were. We still get people going by and giving us the finger. There are people who won’t come in, people who don’t understand why we feel the need to put this flag in the window.
I have a tattoo on my wrist that says, “Trust the Journey,” a quote and exact calligraphy by Thich Nhat Hanh. The tattoo is a tangible reminder to trust myself. I got it to acknowledge my first year of sobriety which has been eleven years now. It was a doozy of a year because I was also ending a 23-year marriage. I had to pivot from that and figure out what was next. But I did. And now I’m here.
Sometimes I worry I won’t succeed. I have invested everything I have here. And it’s not just me — I have family working here and other employees with livelihoods connected to Perch.
But 99 percent of the time I am happy. Happy I am here. Ready to start my day. I love Perch! I love who she is. My next tattoo will say “BAKE” on one hand and “LOVE” on the other.
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