Jim Franks is not a professional baker, because there are no such things as professional bakers. He is also not your father and never will be, nor is this a cookbook full of stories and recipes. This is a book about bread, titled Existential Bread, fresh out of Drag City’s oven on January 31, 2025.

Jim Franks is a baker and a poet who’s written a love story about bread — which is to say he’s written a life story about listening, learning, trying, failing, adapting, and above all, caring. His debut book builds on a life-consuming passion for quality bread: what goes into it, physically and emotionally. Based in Chicago, Jim is known locally for selling out of loaves quickly, but across the country he’s worked under nearly every bread baker equally obsessed with 100 percent whole grain. Through humor, history, relentless curiosity, and refreshingly unsentimental poetry, Existential Bread teaches there are many ways to bake a loaf just as there are many ways to live a life.

“Existential Bread is a collected bakers’ common sense from Jim Franks, one of the most knowledgeable people about modern baking in the United States today.”

— Matt Kedzie, Owner-Baker of Starter Bread

“Part love letter, part philosophical manifesto, Jim Frank’s book is an earnest and charming exploration of our human relationship with bread and what it takes to make it.”

— Fiona Cook, Author of The Wheel of the Year

"In a world of samey-samey, this book is different. Jim Franks doesn't want you to make his bread (by providing glossy photos and detailed recipes); he wants you to make your bread (by sharing his practice and what he has learned). In a world of "shoulds" and "bottom lines", Existential Bread creates space while providing structure for you to fall in love with the ancient act of making bread.
Plus, it's a very fun read."

— Abra Berens, Author of Ruffage, Grist and Pulp

"Existential Bread is an immeasurable joy. Occupying a space between prose and poetry, it lays out a helpful set of directions, while still casting out beautiful elegiac koans like 'imagine how the bread feels.’ It is an ode to finally letting go. To letting the simplest elements transform themselves into the rich, deep, almost-religious experience of baking."

— Jason Hammel, Owner-Chef of Lula Cafe

“I didn't want to like this book. The casual and loose profanity had me clutching my pearls. And it's a cookbook written like one long poem. Yet, somehow against these odds I was charmed the further I got into it. There's a shitload of fucking excellent information about bread in this book.”

— Brooks Headley, Owner-Chef of Superiority Burger