The gate of the deserted bakery opens around December 15, and the dormant wood-fired oven lights up. The cold and dingy earthen floor warms up — to welcome back workers and customers. When the aroma of freshly baked cakes fills the atmosphere of Kabardanga’s Taltala Math area, neighbours know that Karco Bakery is back in action for Christmas. For the next 15 days, the oven bakes cakes for 24 hours non-stop, until it falls into slumber again on December 25. My Kolkata dropped in ahead of Christmas to feel the old-world charm of the bakery and learn its story.
Surrendering to modernisation
The bakery once produced cakes, breads and biscuits before shutting down operations in 2012
Once a thriving bakery, the 34-year-old Karco baked breads, biscuits and cakes throughout the year. However, in the last 10 years, the operations of the bakery have been reduced to 15 days a year. The bakery does not bake cakes for sale, but does mixing and baking for customers walking in with ingredients. With 18-20 workers, the two owners — Sheikh Abdul Manan and Salahuddin Mullick — run the bakery only during Christmas for some extra earnings.
Sheikh Abdul Manan expounds, “I bought this place and started the bakery in 1990. We made loaves of bread, biscuits and cakes and delivered them to the local shops. During Christmas, we started baking fruit cakes for our customers with the ingredients they got. The proportions and recipe are given by them. Only the mixing and baking are done by us. After hand-mixing the batter, the baking is done in our traditional wood-fired oven.”
Owners Sheikh Abdul Manan and Salahuddin Mullick
The business of Karco Bakery petered out as machines took over in the bigger bakeries nearby. Electric ovens doused the woodfire of the small ones and the mixing machines mixed faster than a man’s hand could. The production was doubled, making it faster and easier for bakeries who could afford the machines. “More production means more earning. The bakeries could raise the pay scale of their employees too, while delivering more products. We couldn’t afford the machines, so I sold this bakery around 2012 and returned to my village in Howrah district to take up farming.”
The buyer of the bakery could not revive the business either and shut it. But soon around Christmas, some loyal customers turned up. The news reached Manan, who then decided to make arrangements with the owner. “We agreed and decided to open 15 days before Christmas for our customers. We did not want to make cakes for sale. That would be a risk if the cakes did not sell. Customers, especially Christian families from Kabardanga, Thakurpukur and Behala, come here. They like making the cakes as per their preferences. They give us the ingredients accordingly,” explained Manan, 75.
The batter is filled in foils and the customer adds a name tag on the top to identify their cakes after baking
The traditional baking methods pull crowds to the bakery even today. Customer service is paramount for Manan and his team. When asked why people still prefer to bake their cakes over buying them from stores, he told My Kolkata: “All cakes in the market taste the same. No pure butter or ghee. The ingredients aren’t of high quality — no matter how much you pay. When customers bake their own cakes, they put the best ingredients. They can put less or more fruits and nuts, alter the sweetness and monitor the entire baking process. The woodfire also adds to the aroma and flavours of the cake. The mixing by hand is done carefully, ensuring everything is mixed well. Amra haat diye jaa bujhte parbo, taa ki machine parbe? (What we can touch, feel and understand, can a machine ever do that?)”
Out of the oven, the cakes are cooled off and packed
The hustle and bustle at the bakery after December 20 speaks for its popularity in the area. Customers queue up at 7am and the baking goes on in batches till late in the night. Manan claimed that 75 per cent of Christians in Kabardanga bake their cakes at Karco and most of them are regulars. “People have been visiting us since the 1990s. Some customers turn up with 30kg of ingredients to make cakes. They are usually from churches or NGOs,” he said.
Mita Ghosh, a resident of Kabardanga, has been following her family’s tradition of getting cakes baked at this bakery for the past 30 years. Packing up the hot cakes in a carton, she told us, “When we distribute cakes to our friends and family, they look for the customised touch in them. Cake toh shob rokom e paowa jaye bajarer boro boro dokane. (All kinds of cakes are available in the big confectioneries.) But, the cakes we make lovingly, have a personal touch to them. Also, I feel, that the baking is better in a clay oven. There is a traditional taste to it.”
Imtaj Sheikh places the cakes inside the oven
As three workers mixed the batter in large woks, Imtaj Sheikh monitored the cakes inside the oven. With a long wooden spatula, he took out the trays, tossed the cake out of the mould and inspected the bottom of the cakes. “You have to see the back and check if the cake is baked from the inside as the top layer turns brown easily,” said Sheikh, who makes muri (puffed rice) for a living back at his home in Amtala. He has been with Karco for the past 10 years.
Baking takes up to 45 minutes. Wood is burnt in the chamber on the right side of the oven. The batter is filled in foils, placed on a tray and put inside the oven. Once done, the cakes are taken out and allowed to cool before packing. The clay oven can fit up to 45 cakes of half and one pound. “We don’t overcrowd the oven with too many cakes because then it becomes difficult to manage. The process is slow, but people can trust us to get it right every time,” Sheikh said with pride.
The mixing of the batter is also done manually as customers pour the ingredients in large woks one by one
Like Imtaj, most workers at Karco are all involved in some other profession, but during this time of the year, they spend their days baking here. “It is true that we all come for some extra money. But, it is also because we like doing this every year for our customers who have been dedicated to us for years. I am getting old, after me Salahuddin (co-owner) will take this legacy forward. We may not ever modernise, but will continue to serve the customers,” concluded Manan.
