How a breadwinner lost its charm in Goa

Joao Menino Godinho had a choice. Having retired from the state health department after decades of service, he could have easily led a relaxed life, putting his monthly pension to good use.
He tried that for a couple of years after retirement. But life wasn’t the same. So, he decided to get back to something he had learned from his father at the age of 14: bake bread the traditional way.
At a time when family-run bakeries in Goa have shut down or changed hands due to rising costs and a lack of interest among the younger generation, Godinho’s move took many by surprise.For the septuagenarian, it was the most logical vocation after retirement.
“Now I am doing what my father used to do,” 75-year-old Godinho tells TOI as he bakes bread for the evening. “This bakery is more than a century old. It’s here that my father and other family members prepared bread for decades. Even if the volume (of bread) now is not like it was in the good old days, I have to continue the tradition.”
DOUGH OF HISTORYG
Godinho Bakery is among the oldest in Salcete and is located at the Majorda junction. History is baked into that spot. It was in this Salcete village that the Portuguese first taught the locals to prepare bread in the 1550s. From here, the quintessentially Goan bread made its way to the rest of the state, later Bombay (now Mumbai) through migration, and eventually to other parts of the country. “The first bakery (in Goa) was set up at Gomes waddo in the house of one Paixao Gomes,” says Radharao Gracias, a former legislator and author from Majorda. “It came to be known as the house of Paixao poder (from padeiro, the Portuguese word for baker),” Gracias says.
“The old house has been demolished and the family is now no longer in the (bakery) business. In fact, in Majorda and the neighbouring villages where bread making first took root, most of the bakers have shut shop. There are only a handful of bakeries run by locals.” Most bakers are from Salcete, with villages like Majorda, Utorda, Cansaulim, Chinchinim, and Nuvem populated with predominantly family-owned bakeries. They were the first to learn the art and set up bakeries across Goa. According to Gracias, when the Portuguese arrived in Goa, they didn’t take a liking to the locally available rice and gram chapatis. “They were all accustomed to bread, and when it was not available here, they decided to teach Goans to bake,” he says. The first to be handpicked for lessons, Gracias says, were those involved in making kadio bodio or khaje, a popular street food during zatras.
MAJORDA’S SECRET SAUCE: TODDY
For the Jesuit priests, sacramental bread or sacred host, used in the Christian ritual of the Eucharist, was a must while they were converting Goans. The choice of Majorda for the bread experiment wasn’t coincidental.
“Majorda had the best quality of toddy, a key ingredient in the preparation of bread,” explains Zena Coutinho, an ambassador with Soul Travelling which conducts a daily ‘Life of Pao’ experience. “The Portuguese had a plan and chose to teach the art exclusively to the families of Chardos (formerly Kshatriyas and Vanis who converted to Christianity) because they deemed them the most hygienic for the purpose.”
The ‘Life of Pao’ tour at Majorda embraces the intricacies of bread making at the Godinhos’ bakery on wood fire. Guests can even try their hand at preparing one at the rustic mud bakery that makes bread the traditional way, using toddy (sap of the coconut flower), rather than yeast which today’s bakers find economical.
Even though bread is an integral part of Goa, traditional bakers like Godinho are rare. In recent years, many family-run bakeries are closing or renting out their businesses to non-Goans.
PROFIT SLICES TRADITION
In Salcete, 75% of the bakeries have either shut down or contracted to outsiders,” says Agapito Menezes, president of the All-Goa Association of Bakers (AGAB) which has over 500 registered bakers. “Goans have migrated and there’s nobody to run the business. There is no profit in making only bread,” Menezes says. “Everyone is giving up. If you club bread making with biscuits, cake, toast, pattice and other stuff, you can make something.”

It’s also true, says Menezes, that Goans no longer want to beassociated with the business of making bread, paving the way for workers from Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Kerala to take centre stage.
“Goans don’t want this back-breaking work any more. Everyone wants a white-collar job (here) but abroad, you’ll do any work for the money,” Menezes says. “Pao (Portuguese for bread) is Goa’s identity. We must ensure that the way Goan bread is made does not change.”
‘Teh poder ghelle, teh pao ghelle’ (gone are those bakers, gone that bread) was once a popular phrase used when an unpopular governor general was recalled by the Portuguese regime. Today, in terms of bread, those words sound truer than ever before.