Baking bread in a pandemic isn’t for the faint of heart.

Ron Mendoza is a natural-born pressure player. At the level he’s cooked at, and the people he’s cooked with, he’s had to be.

He’s done time in the kitchens of Joachim Splichal (Patina) and Michelle Myers (Sona), Thomas Keller (you know, Thomas Keller), all before landing on the Monterey Peninsula as executive pastry chef at Aubergine. From there, it was on to the sweetest little idea to hit the Peninsula yet – Revival Ice Cream, opened in 2016.

What came next is maybe the best bread available anywhere. From inside Seaside’s Other Brother Beer Co., Mendoza and his team occupy a corner with a multi-deck Pavallier oven and produce an array of bread that includes super-crisp yet soft-crumbed baguettes; soft, sweet (and yes, at $15 a loaf, spendy) milk bread; and whole wheat, olive-studded or cinnamon-raisin loaves. When there’s not a pandemic happening, Mendoza also serves up an array of snacks, including bread with hummus, pickles and olives; cheese plates; and, swoon, a pretzel with spicy beer mustard. And flatbreads, which aren’t so flat, but meld a crispy-on-the-outside, fluffy-on-the-inside crust with toppings like tomato, garlic and oregano and potato, fontina and parsley, just to name a few.

Now, with shelter-in-place orders closing all but essential services, Mendoza has pivoted again, keeping his shop open three days a week for curbside service, selling at the Carmel Valley and Pacific Grove farmers markets (Sunday and Monday) and taking a rest in between.

The Weekly caught up with Mendoza after a day of baking and selling at the shop.

Weekly: What are your days like now as compared to before the shelter-in-place order?

Mendoza: Literally every day it seems like we’re making a new business model. We’re open at 11am and we come in at 6am. It’s trying to time everything out and not go in at 2am, for the sanity of the staff. I get in and turn on the oven.

The oven is a whole other story. I wanted to make Tartine-style bread and to do that you want a deck oven with a hearth and steam injection to get that nice deep color, crispy but with a chew. Our doughs have a lot of water in them, and it’s a long process with natural fermentation. It takes almost three days from start until it comes out of the oven, and I wanted to get this oven, the Pavallier. It can do 65 loaves an hour and we decided, if we’re gonna do this, we’re gonna do this in a real way. This oven is great and we can do a lot with it.

We got this oven and the contractor approved it going into the space, but the building we’re in doesn’t have enough power to supply our oven. We were supposed to get an upgrade from PG&E, but then Covid happened and we’re running the oven on a generator parked in the back of the building.

We’re spending $6,000 a month on utilities alone, and that’s why we’re struggling to get by. Every day we ask, ‘Is it worth it, is it worth it?’’ but the big thing everyday in talking to people is them saying, “We love this bread.” Every time I hear those stories, it’s worth it.

What’s your favorite thing to make?

Right now it’s a love-hate in learning to make baguettes. Doing baguettes is the thing now. The thing about sourdough is every day it’s different and every day you have to pay attention to it. After being in regular pastry for 20 years, it’s reawakened my senses. How does the dough feel and how does it look? It’s a fascinating thing.

What’s your favorite thing to eat?

Super easy. I know this one. A banh mi. There’s a good use of herbs, and then the pork and the vegetables and the heat and creamy mayonnaise.

I bought a loaf of milk bread from you and you kind of half-explained, half-apologized for the cost. Why?

I’ve had some people say, “Oh your bread is expensive,” and that’s something I battle with. We’re in Seaside, not Carmel, but the price is relative to the ingredients we’re using, not the location. I have workers and I charge enough to pay them and pay for the building. We use organic flours and good ingredients and we know the care of things we eat is vitally important.

Going into the shutdown, I thought we could still be doing some sandwiches, and then I said no, let’s just focus on the bread.

AD ASTRA BREAD CO. is at 877 Broadway Ave., Seaside. Current hours are 11am-5pm Thu-Sat. info@adastrabread.com, adastrabread.com