Mark Fiorentino

With his inimitable dead pan humor, baker Mark Fiorentino claims to have carved out his career path simply by addressing resumes to all the restaurants whose names appeared in bold capital letters in the 1998 Zagat survey. Yet, to know Mark is to know that he is as humble as his bread is delicious.

A career in the food world comes as no surprise for a young man whose family turned out some of the Northeast’s best ricotta and mozzarella for over 60 years. With his family’s Brunetto cheese but a memory by the time Mark graduated from Fordham College in 1987, he went on to forge a path of his own.

The baker whose bread graces the tables of all of Daniel Boulud’s Manhattan restaurants would have us believe he chose the Scottsdale Culinary Institute for its sunny climate and its strategic location adjacent to a great golf course. The availability of an intensive nine month course and the opportunity to leave New York City behind for a while may have been additional motivations.

During his culinary studies, it was his pastry instructor who impressed Mark the most and steered him towards a career in baking. Back in New York, Mark had his resume handed out by a friend in the wine business who happened to have top restaurants as his clients. The savvy approach led to a position in the pastry kitchen at the Sign of the Dove, at the time, a leading Manhattan destination restaurant. There, Chef Craig Kominiak convinced Mark that to become a successful pastry chef he would have to master the art of bread making. Fortuitously for Mark the group that owned Sign of the Dove had also launched Ecce Panis, from its inception, one of the city’s leading artisanal bread bakeries. They had become known for traditional bread baking enlivened by creative recipes for both sweet and savory breads. In the two years he spent at Ecce Panis, Mark mastered their renowned breads, from their pecan raisin loaves to their Neo Tuscan Rosemary rings, along with a myriad of specialty focaccia and brioches.

In 1998 as Ecce Panis was making a transition from its artisanal roots to a more industrial scale business, this dedicated baker felt it was time for a change. If timing is as important as talent, Mark could not have been better placed. His talent was all too apparent, while his timing placed him on the doorstep of Chef Daniel Boulud who was then planning the opening of his new restaurant DANIEL. DANIEL was to have the rare and wonderful luxury of its own in-house bread kitchen. Craftsmanship and tradition have resulted in a collaboration between Boulud and Fiorentino that is now well in to its 14th year. Since 1998 Mark Fiorentino has guided the bread kitchen that bakes each day for six restaurants including DANIEL, Café Boulud, db Bistro Moderne, DBGB Kitchen and Bar, Bar Boulud, Boulud Sud and for Épicerie Boulud, Chef Daniel Boulud's eat-in and take-out market. Mark and his staff of nine bake over 25 varieties daily. He has created unique breads that are now delicious touches of these fine restaurants.

When it comes to wonderful bread, nothing can replace quality ingredients, slow, gentle fermentation and the hand shaping of dough. These factors are what distinguish Mark Fiorentino’s fine artisanal bread as compared to the more common industrial loaves so prevalent today. Whether it is the wonderfully chewy and distinctly salted pretzel roll created for DB Bistro, the rosemary-olive roll or the parmesan-garlic focaccia at DANIEL or the tiny butter-filled rolls at Café Boulud, these restaurants would not be the same without these special touches bearing the baker’s distinctive signature.