Celebrated baker Kwok Kam-chuen opts to use a machine for the first time
SIDNEY.LENG@SCMP.COM
UPDATED : Saturday, 14 May, 2016, 10:46am
Kwok Kam-chuen, owner of Kowk Kam Kee, making buns ahead of the Cheung Chau Bun Festival. Photo: David Wong
The 21st century has come to the Cheung Chau Bun Festival this year, with the island’s oldest “lucky bun” maker mechanising the process for the first time this year.
As is traditionally the case during the week of the bun festival, the Kwok Kam Kee Cake Shop has been a hive of activity with the kitchen filled with white flour powder as bakers mix flour, yeast, water, and sugar to make a stiff paste.
The difference this year is that owner Kwok Kam-chuen has brought in a giant food processing machine to speed up the decades-old tradition of hand-making buns for the annual festival.
Kwok said the Japanese Rheon-manufactured machine can produce 20 buns a minute – twice as fast as by hand.
“I’m not sure about other places, but I am the first one in Cheung Chau to use a machine to make buns,” he said.
Watch: How Cheung Chau prepares for its annual Piu Sik parade
Kwok’s steamed “lucky buns,” which have the Chinese characters ‘Ping An’, meaning ‘peace’ on their surface, are popular edible souvenirs for the tens of thousands of people who flock to the island for the festival every year. When the Post visited his signature cake shop on Pak She Street, group after group of tourists, were taking selfies against the shop’s front and the buns for sale.
The shop’s business reaches its peak period during the week of the festival, when Kwok’s team make and sell between 50,000 and 60,000 buns, some of which are prepared for three bamboo-made bun towers built for worshipping the island’s god, Pak Tai. As the festival reaches its climax on Saturday, the shop’s output is likely to approach its record of producing 10,000 buns a day.
“Normally, I don’t have many staff, only my wife, my younger brother and two other staff, because business is not that good,” Kwok said. “But during the festival, I will hire a dozen temporary workers … since it’s a very short-term job, it’s also very hard to find workforce.”
That’s where this year the HK$400,000 machine has come in to help - to reduce the pressure of hiring and streamline the process of making buns. Once the paste and fillings are ready, all that Kwok needs to do is monitor the quality of buns before they are put into ovens.
“I am still studying it [the machine],” he said. “But I think the machine-made buns are not much different from our hand-made ones.”
At 65, Kwok is still in high spirits as he keeps the business running as it was 40 years ago, when he first opened it with his uncle. The shop’s size and design has barely changed over the years as it has churned out “lucky buns”, as well as a variety of Chinese biscuits.
Born and raised in Cheung Chau, Kwok said the festival had brought in more local and mainland tourists in the past few years partly due to the government’s promotion of the event. In 2011, the Cheung Chau Bun Festival was placed on China’s national list of intangible cultural heritage.
As he faces retirement age, the key issue facing Kwok now is to whom he should pass on the business.
“My eldest son has paid some interest to it. He is considering it,” he said.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education-community/article/1944596/man-behind-bun-meet-cheung-chau-baker-mass
