The Graveyard Shift
While most of the city sleeps, a handful of Ottawans are quietly plugging away in the peaceful predawn hours. Long before most are rolling out of bed, bagel shops are rolling out dough for the day. While aromas of coffee grounds fill homes, servers working the graveyard shift have been keeping pots hot all night, for themselves and the few sparse guests. The last of deliveries are being made to coffee shops, providing the upcoming herds of bleary-eyed patrons their much-needed fix of on-the-go coffee and breakfast.
The hours between midnight and breakfast are romantic ones for the few who experience them. Working in a bar gives me some insight into this life. Though I’m typically in bed by 5 a.m., I still enjoy a glimpse into a world that has slowed down, but is far from rest.
Once guests leave my bar, I vibrate with a quiet energy. I first turn down the music — oftentimes Coltrane or instrumental hip hop — turn the lights up, and start the post-shift clean-up. When I head home, there’s hardly a car or person in sight.
Those served until last call are undoubtedly tucked away, asleep and satiated. A handful of restaurant folk are still plugging away on the job, others are heading home for the night and some are already hopping out of the shower, readying themselves for the day ahead.
On one of my days off, during coveted sleeping hours, I visited other non-nine-to-fivers who ensure the night unfolds as it should — coffee on for the worker on the run, pastries baked for the upcoming bustle of grab-and-run breakfast and menus ready for nocturnal types as estranged as we are from the idea of normal waking hours.
Maciej Ostapinski at Bridgehead Coffee
Maciej Ostapinski jokes about it. He works nine to five, he says. But that’s the 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. shift. And he makes the best of it. Everything is reversed. He goes to sleep around 11 a.m. or noon — a 12-hour divergence from the usual pattern.
Ostapinski is a driver for Bridgehead Coffee, Ottawa’s chain coffee-shop darling. With 19 stores across the city, it’s his job to load the truck at the roastery and deliver to all the shops in time for the rush of early risers needing their caffeine fix. The benefits of missing rush hour are not lost on a man, who night after night, drives all across town.
Having worked the overnight shift for six months now, Ostapinski finds it becomes easier to balance his work and home life. Navigating the early morning run is easier with eight hours of work done and the end of shift in sight. A night’s worth of lifting and loading boxes, embracing the beauty of the city at rest is relaxing, almost tonic. Ostapinski finds himself saying “good morning” more often on his homeward walk from work.
The Bridgehead kitchen cooks and bakes daily, making sure everything is ready for Ostapinski’s ministrations. He plans his nightly route, delivering it in three loads, starting at the farthest points and moving into the downtown core. Last on his schedule is the Shepherds of Good Hope, where Bridgehead donates all of their unsold foodstuffs.
Bridgehead Roastery and Coffeehouse
130 Anderson St., Ottawa, Ont.
bridgehead.ca, 613.233.1221, @bridgeheadcoffee
Nathan Ayegran at The Ottawa Bagelshop and Deli
While Ostapinski is getting back to the roastery, I’m getting to the Ottawa Bagelshop and Deli to watch Nathan Ayegran in his element, efficiently and seamlessly moving from one task to the next, knocking out dozens upon dozens of crunchy and fresh Montreal-style bagels.
Ayegran has worked at the bagel shop for eight and a half years and he’s got it down to a science. This is the first job he found in Canada after arriving from Myanmar. He starts at four in the morning by firing up the oven, which he’ll keep hot and ready throughout his shift. He adds maple logs as needed to keep temperature steady at 400F or so. There’s no thermometer, but his eye gauges the heat by checking the rising and browning of the bagels.
While the oven heats up, Ayegran starts the first batch of dough: eggs, flour, malt flour, oil, sugar and yeast, which he’ll measure and move to a mixer. The mixing and proofing takes about 40 minutes, ready in time for the second set of hands that comes in at dawn, Ro Bin Ngwa, his coworker, slices off dough and rolls it out into rings.
Ayegran now turns his focus to soaking three dozen uncooked bagels in simmering honey water before placing them on two 15-inch planks and sliding them into the now-hot oven. At first, raising those long loaded planks was strenuous, but he hardly notices anymore.
Every 15 minutes or so — between soaking bagels, cleaning planks and topping the specialty bagels with oats, rosemary or poppy seeds — Ayegran tosses 36 perfectly browned bagels over his shoulder and off the plank into a basket to cool. With practice, it’s all become one fluid motion.
Ngwa constantly rolls out fresh dough into rings for the oven. Focused on their tasks, both are silent. They’ve got plenty of bagels to bake before opening. On average, they’ll tackle about 55 dozen every 90 minutes, 60 dozen if things are hairy, not uncommon on weekends and holidays. During the early hours they try to accumulate enough of a buffer to stay ahead of demand.
Even eight years of full-time bagel duty hasn’t dulled Ayegran’s love of their delicious flavour, doughy interior and textured crust. “I have at least one a day,” he laughs. His favourite is the cinnamon bagel, which he eats plain, though the spicy aromas filling the room might serve as a condiment.
An energizing bagel fuels the unending repetitions of rolling, boiling, baking and tossing, and the constant stoking of the massive fire.
Ayegran will work throughout the morning, typically clocking out at 11:30 a.m. But his day isn’t over. From the bagel shop, he goes on to his part-time job as a cleaner. He gets only one full day off, Sunday, a respite he treasures.
Not wanting to overstay my welcome, I say my goodbyes so the pros can get back to their work. Ayegran still has five hours of sesame- and poppy-seeding bagels before his day takes other turns.
Ottawa Bagelshop and Deli
1321 Wellington St. W., Ottawa, Ont.
ottawabagelshop.com | 613.722.8753 | @ottawabagelshop
Myles Bell at The Elgin Street Diner
Stepping out into the tranquil darkness of Hintonburg, I await my Uber. Estimated to arrive in seven minutes, it gets there in three. There’s still no traffic on the streets.
The car pulls up in front of the Elgin Street Diner at 6 a.m. and there’s an hour left in Myles Bell’s shift. He’s been working overnight at the diner for the past 11 years. The brightly lit space offers a contrast to the dim morning outside. Little is happening. Four men sit, noses in newspapers or eyes on their screens, each of them dining alone.
“The bar rush that hits at 2 a.m. will usually last till 3:30 or 4 a.m. and is quickly followed by two hours. which I refer to as ‘the ghostly hours,’” Bell notes. From 4 to 6 a.m. he does his cleaning and may serve two or three people. “But usually, it’s eerily quiet.”
As I missed the busier hours of the night, Bell walks me through a typical shift: couples out for a late night snack, solo diners having an in-and-out bite, and, of course, the post-last-call rush. Serving food on Elgin Street after bars close means hordes of hungry partiers every night of the week. Fridays and Saturdays will see lineups from 1:30 to 3:00 a.m., though weeknights may also know these surges. An earlier rush at midnight accommodates more responsible bar-goers, “those who want to be somewhat coherent the following day,” Bell says with a laugh.
He notes, however, that lineups aren’t as long as they once were. Before his time, lore has it that massive lines formed every night of the week. He associates the change with the current ease of having late-night grub delivered to your home.
Working these hours for more than a decade provides certain comforts, but at some loss of convenience. Sure, he avoids the bustle of day-to-day life — but any pressing requirements must be dealt with during standard workday hours, which can be a challenge when you get off work at 7 a.m. in the morning. “I’ll be out getting new plates for my car or waiting in line at the passport office and I will feel like a zombie. It’s how a ‘normal’ person would feel at 3 a.m.” He jokes that he lives a life of many naps.
As we speak near the end of his shift, Bell is far from zoned out. He coasts around topping up coffee, cleaning and making small talk with guests. “I pride myself on knowing people’s faces, what they like to eat, where they like to sit,” he says. “It’s what I enjoy most about my job.”
His last hour is pretty quiet until just before 7 a.m., when all at once the client count triples. Cutlery clatters and conversations swell. Individual diners are gone and now couples are seated. There’s an energetic hum in the kitchen and Myles’ speed picks up until he can finally turn over his tables to the next shift.
While most people are facing a new workday, Myles is done. He grabs his food and he’s off to bed.
For many, 7 a.m. marks the start of the day: a leisurely stretch and roll out of bed — or maybe an unresigned slam of the snooze button. Others are further along, grabbing a coffee on their way to the bus stop. Maciej Ostapinski has already enjoyed a few hours of post-shift relaxation.
The Ottawa Bagelshop is just opening, with hundreds of warm bagels ready for the day.
Time your visit just right and you can grab a cinnamon bagel fresh from the oven — with or without toppings, just as you wish. It’s dawn and a new day.
Elgin Street Diner
374 Elgin St., Ottawa, Ont.
elginstreetdiner.com, 613.237.9700
