Volunteer Guides Bakery in Development of New Products

Through ACDI/VOCA's USAID-funded Russia Farmer to Farmer program, a U.S. baker helped the “Georgievskyi Khlebokombinat” company expand its assortment of sugar- and fat-free bakery products, make more low-calorie cakes and pastries with vegetable-based cream, and add omega-3 additives to its products.

“Georgievskyi Khlebokombinat” markets its bakery products to stores all over Stavropol krai. The town in which the company is located is surrounded by many health resorts, whose patrons form a market for bakery products that meet their health needs. Maurice Kalisky, a bakery consultant and baker from California, was invited to work at Georgievskiy Khlebokombinat at the beginning of February 2007. He provided advice on current bakery operations and technology improvements and analyzed the flavor of Russian bakery products. Kalisky provided recommendations on production technology of low-calorie cakes and pastries with vegetable-based cream, bakery products with fat and sugar replacements, and bakery products for diabetics. Kalisky and the specialists of the company created new products based on their analysis and baked trial batches of these products.

Out of more than 100 recipes, Maurice Kalisky and the bakers of Georgievskyi Khlebokombinat chose 10 products, including “red velvet” cupcakes, lemon cake, carrot cake with raisins, and ginger cake. Maurice constructed a ginger bread house that was given as a gift to one of the host’s friends for his birthday. They also made bread sticks with poppy, caraway and sesame seeds to enjoy with beer. Maurice demonstrated one particular product that is very popular in the U.S.: oatmeal cookies with vanilla ice cream sandwiched between them and dipped in chocolate.

This was Maurice’s second trip to Georgievskiy Khlebokombinat. This time he tried to offer more healthful, reduced-fat and sugar-free products suitable for diabetics. Most of the products he made had both sugar and sugar replacements, allowing the host to bake the same product with almost the same flavor both for healthy people and for those who suffer from diabetes.

Maurice had meetings with newspaper reporters as well as the mayor of Georgievsk to talk about ACDI/VOCA activities and aims as well as his own job and interests.