Years ago I did a bakery tour of Baltimore for a reporter, no one else, just her and me. She was a food writer looking for a fresh story and I had been studying ethnic neighborhoods. Among the many delights I discovered were yummy one-of-a-kind bakeries, each one filled with tastes and aromas of the old country. I picked the reporter up at her house on a warm Saturday morning in August and drove her to 5 bakeries in 5 different neighborhoods. She turned on her tape recorder in the front passenger seat of my car and I talked about Baltimore history. Leaving each bakery, we'd open all the doors of the car and let the heat escape; it was a terribly hot day. We returned to the car five times carrying pastry and fresh baked samples that the bakers wanted us to have. We put them on the back seat. After several bakeries, I opened the car doors and was struck by the aroma of sticky buns, apple strudel, and rum buns! It's a good thing we weren't stopped by a police officer, he would not have had to look for a bottle, the car reeked of rum! I thought that giving the reporter the sweets when I dropped her off at her house might help her write a really good article about me and my Baltimore tours. All's fair in love, war and free advertising. She managed to carry her tape recorder and reporter's notebook and all those boxes and bags of goodies up her front walk and the porch steps and into her house. She said her parents were coming from out of town for a week-long visit, and there would be dessert for the whole week. My car smelled of rum for days. And when the article ran in the paper, it covered the entire first page of the Food Section. A photograph of me filled the space above the fold, the story she wrote filled up the rest of page one and carried over to three full columns on page two. Writing about this story in another Baltimore August is hard work! I deserve one of those rum buns right now.
Zippy Baltimore
"Best tours of Baltimore" - CITY Paper
"Best Tour Guide" - BALTIMORE Magazine
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