The urge to travel and see the world is present in all of us, for the human species it is about
expanding their knowledge and skill sets. Goans have been leaving the state for
exotic parts of the world for work or to learn new skills. What is interesting
however is the tendency of Goans to leave to learn new skill sets and then
return after a couple of years to establish their business and teach their
skills to locals who are interested.
Chef Kunal Arolkar, a Pastry Chef with
Michelin-starred Experience, is the Founder and Head Trainer at Foodybreaks and
runs Foodybreaks Bakery Academy in Porvorim, Goa’s first City & Guilds (UK)
affiliated pastry school. With over a decade of experience in the Pastry and
Bakery sector, from a career spanning three continents, from India, Maldives,
Switzerland, the UK and Tanzania and Congo, he stills gets amused by the
simplest of desserts. A no-nonsense chef, his belief in the power of positive
thinking and ardent desire for skill development and women empowerment led him
to start his academy in Porvorim, with an interest to guide budding bakers in
Goa.
Chef Kunal says, “FB Academy Goa was
created to fill in the gap for professional and hobby-based bakery and pastry
learning in Goa. Our Academy was conceptualised in a boutique setting, to relax
the learners and to introduce Goa to hands-on learning programs that focus on
teaching core pastry skills, rather than just Insta-worthy pastry. Today, we
are Goa’s first City & Guilds UK approved pastry school. It is the only one
of its kind offering the prestigious International Diploma in Patisserie, with
two batches every year, one in January and one in June. We also operate our
in-house 1 month certificate FB Weekend Workshops or All the Hobby Learners,
throughout the year.”
Explaining his desire to come to Goa, he says, “My forefathers
were originally from Pernem but my relatives now live in Mapusa. I was born and
raised in Mumbai, but frequent holiday visits to Goa kept me rooted to my Goan
culture and I felt a strong yearning to return to my roots to fulfil my dream
of ‘Making Goa Bake Great Again!’
“During my visits, I saw the huge gap between the bakery
products we get in Goa and what we get in our metropolitan cities or abroad,
and I always felt that we could easily bridge this gap, so it was either, open
a bakery or a bakery academy, and I thought, why not do both, cause and effect!
“So here I am, with the support of Socorro, and our loving
learners and foodie patrons. I travel around but Goa is and will always remain
my base.”
Yet another baker, Allison Lobo, is quickly making her mark in
Goa with dessert baking by Foodybreaks. As a kid, she used to join her mother
in her cooking sessions, which she found very interesting. She ventured into
bread-making when she returned to Goa from Kuwait, after leaving her job at
Kuwait Airways. When the local ‘poder’ (baker) stopped delivering, they had to
travel quite a distance at odd times to get the local bread. This gave her the
initial push to try out baking local bread. She say, “My father earlier had
experimented and succeeded in making bread, and he shared that knowledge with
me. I then started experimenting and dwelling deeper into the subject and got
intrigued with the complexities of the art. The first bread I baked was
reasonably similar in shape to the bread from the traditional bakery but lacked
the consistency and flavour. I then felt the urge to achieve the finer points
to match up to the baker’s standards.”
She adds that she realised that bread-making was not just a
recipe but a science, where there where so many factors to take into account,
like ambient atmospheric temperature, humidity, air circulation, etc.
Allison says that her important mission involves the empowerment
of women, not just in word but in spirit: “I have formed a platform where my
students interested in home production in their spare time can register and get
exposure to persons in Goa and every corner of the world who want a supply of
fresh true Goan bread just like the way it used to be. I aim to build up the
traditional strength within families here and abroad, among Goans spread all
over the world. I have created till date 700 ‘poders’ that at the most will be
passed down to 700 generations and will multiply exponentially in the coming
time. At the end of every class, my students blow the traditional horn as
pronouncement of becoming new ‘poders’.”
One
hopes the aims and ambitions of the two come true over a period of time.
