Doukhobor bread booth gets new home at Saskatoon Ex
By Lara Fominoff, Saskatoon / 650 CKOM, August 11, 2022. Original
article.
Volunteers take fresh-baked bread out of the
clay ovens at the Saskatoon Ex. (Lara Fominoff / 650 CKOM)
It has been a staple at the Saskatoon Ex for decades: Fresh,
clay-oven-baked Doukhobor bread.
After more than 50 years in the same spot, the Saskatoon Doukhobor
Society’s three traditional clay ovens were moved 70 metres south by crane and truck last month earlier
this summer from their original location into a new
building just east of the log cabin, which is also now home to the
new Saskatoon
Ex Museum. See photos
and videos taken on moving day
Added : Google satellite
map showing where the ovens were moved. See photos
and videos taken on moving day.
Society member Dorothy Ozeroff says their new building is “a
palace.”
“It’s beautiful — beautiful,” she said. “It’s got lots of space
for us. We have room to move. It’s wonderful. We really have to
thank Prairieland (Park.)”
The new building has a special room for the three ovens, which
Ozeroff says can bake up to 100 loaves at a time.
The ovens are heated with hardwood and fire. Once the hardwood
turns to ashes and comes to the correct temperature, it’s set
aside so the pans with proofed dough can be placed into the ovens.
It takes about an hour for them to bake to a golden brown.
One hundred pounds of flour go into a giant mixer, along with
seven gallons of water and yeast. The
dough is mixed, then cut and shaped by hand into loaves and
set aside in pans to rise for about half an hour.
Bread baking in the clay ovens at the Saskatoon
Ex. (Lara Fominoff / 650 CKOM)
The society sells on average 600 loaves per day.
“We sell slices with jam and butter or just plain. So between
slices and loaves, it’s about 600,” she said.
The recipe has been passed down through several generations, but
Ozeroff says it’s the ovens that make their loaves taste
different.
“It takes the moisture out of them. It doesn’t have that gluey
taste like (bread) out of an ordinary oven does. The clay ovens
make the difference,” she added.
Added : Photo by Kayle Neis,The
StarPhoenix, Saskatoon, SK, August 8, 2018, page
A3, in
A
taste of Doukhobor history at the Saskatoon Ex, by Alexa
Lawlor.
Each loaf goes for $14, and a large thick
slice costs $6 with jam and/or butter.
Each loaf weighs about 2.25 pounds [1 kilogram].
“This is our major fundraiser,” said Ozeroff. “It keeps our
(Saskatoon) community centre prayer
home operations going.”
Every day, there are three people working the ovens, four in the
kitchen and five to seven in the serving slicing area. Dozens of
volunteers help over the week, including students who want to
learn how to make bread from scratch.
Ozeroff says it’s also a way to preserve their traditions
and culture.
The [Canadian] term “Doukhobor”
means “Spirit Wrestler.” About 7,400 8,000
Doukhobors originally came to Canada from Russia in 1899 with the
help of the Society of Friends and author
Lev N. Leo Tolstoy
after suffering religious persecution. About
8,300 arrived by 1930. Many made their homes in
Saskatchewan, and [then] in B.C.’s Kootenay region.
Archived and enhanced
by Spirit-Wrestlers.com
from: https://www.ckom.com/2022/08/11/doukhobor-bread-booth-gets-new-home-at-saskatoon-ex/