Sara Begin is a ceramic artist, musician, and local chef who believes the best way to show someone they are cared for is to cook for them. (Johnathan Riley photo)
Everyone says “I love you” a little differently. Some say it over the phone, some in person, and others don’t say a word. For ceramicist, fiddle player, guitarist, and Bred in the Bone sous-chef Sara Begin, her most heartfelt declaration is in her cooking.
Begin, of Nobleboro, said she started cooking around the age of seven or eight as a way of showing people she loves them.
“It’s kind of always been my way of expressing that I care, even when I was a kid,” she said. “Whether it was making breakfast, it very early on became my way of showing love because I’m not always great with my words.”
Begin was born in her family’s home on Pleasant Street in Damariscotta to parents very involved in the community and who continue to serve as an inspiration for the way she lives her life now.
“I was lucky enough to grow up kind of embedded in all the wonderful things that go on in this town, like the farms, music, and the local businesses,” she said.
Begin said her parents emphasized the importance of doing something that can have a positive effect on others.
“They’ve always kind of made it clear that it’s important to make sure what you are doing has a purpose and can help others,” she said.
Begin’s parents, David and Jenny Begin, own Salt Bay Trading Company at 584 Route 1 in Newcastle, which sells rugs and stringed instruments. According to Begin, her mother encapsulates the idea of doing something with purpose in the way she describes the rugs the family sells at their business, as “art you can walk on.”
“It’s functional, but it’s still beautiful and serves a purpose,” she said. “That’s always been something that’s been ingrained in me.”
For Begin, that intersection of art, purpose, and serving others manifests in her cooking and to her, the most honest form of communication is action.
“People can say as much as they want, but actions and doing things that mean a lot to you and help other people is really how you show you care,” she said.
Due to family health issues, Begin said she began helping to make breakfast when she was around 7 years old. As she got older, she found opportunity to expand upon her culinary skills at the Maine Fiddle Camp in Liberty where her mother worked in the kitchen.
“The camp is an amazing musical community that was a huge part of our childhood with musicians and kids from all over the world, but even though I went there to play music, I used to try to skip my classes to help out in the kitchen,” she said.
The head chef of the camp recognized Begin’s desire to learn more about cooking and allowed her to help out with baking the daily bread.
“He let me sit on the flour bins so I could reach the table and help him shape all the dough for the focaccia,” she said.
Begin said she was permitted to do more and more in the kitchen at camp as she got older and her love for the craft continued to grow.
When she was 14, Begin met Florin Ungureanu at the Damariscotta farmers market. Ungureanu, the head chef at The Bradley Inn in Bristol at the time, agreed to let her intern in the kitchen and mentor her.
According to Begin, through Ungureanu she met restaurant owners Warren Busteed and Beth Polhemus who continued to give her opportunities to grow her culinary skills in a professional setting.
Begin worked at The Bradley Inn and then The Contented Sole in Pemaquid Harbor until she was 18, when she left to work at Primo in Rockland and then joined River House in Damariscotta as the sous-chef.
In October 2022, Ungureanu approached Begin about being a part of a new restaurant in Damariscotta, Bred in the Bone.
This year Bred in the Bone was featured in Down East Magazine’s Best of Maine as the state’s best new restaurant.
While cooking is a tremendously gratifying experience for Begin, it doesn’t come without its difficulties. Pushing through them helps her get closer to being a better at her craft.
“Cooking can be the most rewarding experience, but it can also break you down a little,” Begin said. “People don’t see what goes into all the trial and error, but making something that makes people feel genuine emotion makes it more than just about food. It’s a piece of me and everyone who works on it and having people feel that through the food is really a really amazing feeling.”
Most of Begin’s week is occupied by her preparation for that night’s dinner service or the service itself, but when she gets a moment she returns to a mainstay passion of hers: ceramics.
Growing up she worked with local potters that were family friends and at Lincoln Academy in Newcastle, Begin furthered her passion for the art in Jonathan Mess’s class.
“For me it’s like therapy, it’s like meditation,” she said. “It’s a way for me to center myself because so much of my life is running around doing 20 things at once, so being able to really stop and focus on something like that is really, really important.”
Begin also has a love for travel and over the years has made trips to Europe to experience other cultures and to see how the people of the world interact with food. The first time Begin traveled to Europe was right after she graduated from Lincoln Academy in 2018.
“It’s an amazing small community, but it’s a small community, so I wanted to remove myself from the habit I was kind of getting into of just being here,” she said. “I started my professional culinary career fairly young and I wanted to learn more about food by seeing it, eating it; by being in places these foods come from.”
Begin said she’s gone to Spain and made her way to the Mediterranean, but eventually found the country of Portugal called to her the most.
“They have such a respect for food, where food really is about joy, about having a good time, about having an experience with food,” she said. “I fell in love with the country of Portugal. I fell in love with the culture, the food, the music. Both food and music have been intertwined in my head.”
While dinner service is happening, Begin said she gets into a rhythm in the kitchen she attributes to her love of music, and finding that groove helps her get lost in the experience.
“Rhythm is important to the way I cook,” she said. “The people I cook with comment that when we really get busy, I’m almost always humming something or singing, just because it helps me stay in the rhythm of moment.”
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