What I Learned from One of Japan’s Most Respected Bakeries: Pain Stock

Pain Stock, Fukuoka

There are moments in a craft that only feel inevitable in hindsight.

Pain Stock is a destination bakery in Fukuoka, Japan —
one of those places people visit not only for bread,
but to understand a way of thinking.

For a long time, Pain Stock existed for me not as a place, but as a presence.
I did not know the bakery directly.
I came across it through books — quietly, without introduction.

But the moment I saw the work, I recognised something.
This was not just technique.
This was someone who understood bread.

Only later did I understand more clearly why.

Pain Stock, led by Chef Tetsuo Hirayama, carries the depth of someone who has spent around 30 years in baking — mature, precise, yet still full of passion.

His bread was deeply inspired by Chef Katsuei Shiga. Chef Hirayama later worked under Chef Shiga in Tokyo for three years, a period that became part of the foundation behind his own method and philosophy.

That was when the name began to carry weight.

Not because it was widely known —
but because it was clear.

Bringing Something New to Malaysia

In Malaysia, we have grown quickly — but not always deeply.

There are techniques we have not yet fully encountered.
Not because we lack effort, but because exposure is limited.

In 2025, Taiyo Milling visited Croisserie and asked how they could support the development of bread in Malaysia.

My answer was clear.

I hoped Taiyo and Marubishi could help invite Chef Shiga and Chef Hirayama of Pain Stock to Malaysia.

Not just for a demonstration,
but as a point of contact.

Not only to learn how to make bread,
but to understand how a bakery is thought through.

Because the real difference is not only in the dough.

It is in how a baker thinks:
not only asking what went wrong,
but why it happened;
not blaming people too quickly,
but understanding the conditions around them;
not only reacting to problems,
but tracing them back to their source.

That way of thinking is rarer than any formula.

Tasting the Work

During the session, I tasted the breads.

They were not designed to impress.
They were consistent with a point of view.

Everything — from structure to flavour — felt intentional.
It was not variation. It was clarity.

This is what I would call bread with thought.

Bread that reflects the decisions behind it,
not just the execution.

On Method, Old and New

When Chef Hirayama visited Croisserie, we spoke about method.

I asked him directly
whether he saw his work as something new —
part of a new wave in contemporary breadmaking.

The answer was simple, and it stayed with me.

It is not new.
It is an extension.

An extension of what already existed —
the foundations of the 1930s baguette,
carried forward through time.

Something close to Respectus Panis —
but reinterpreted through a different lens:

higher hydration,
Yudane and Yugone methods,
a different relationship with water, starch, acidity and structure.

Not a rejection of tradition.
But a continuation.

A Kitchen, A Possibility

He saw our kitchen.
And he liked it.

We spoke about what could come next —
not just another demonstration,
but something more integrated.

A possibility of using the training studio
as a place for exchange.
Not classes.
Not short-term workshops.

But something closer to a residency.

A period where a bakery like Pain Stock
could operate within Croisserie —
bringing its rhythm, its system, its thinking into the space.

What Stays

In the end, what stayed with me was not the technique.
It was the philosophy behind Pain Stock.

The understanding that a bakery is not built quickly.
It is built through repetition, clarity, and time.

And that if you stay with it long enough —
one day, it becomes something others come to see.

I hope that, in time,
through the work I continue to do,
I can also build something that reaches that point.

Not quickly.
Not by imitation.
But properly.