Turning Chocolates into Donuts

by Charlene

I feel like I have mentioned ‘Needs Care’ school often in my blogging because I find their situation so inspirational. That school truly serves the poorest of the poor and while every other school we know of charges at least a modest fee, this school was created for the children who come from homes that couldn’t even afford $3 per term for their children to be educated. They meet in a partially built church that has a dirt floor and only half of a roof. There are 6 full-time teachers who volunteer 100% of their time and they are incredibly dedicated. Esther founded the school when she saw the number of children in her community who didn’t attend school. Zambian schools typically have a problem with teacher turnover and teachers who aren’t committed to coming to school everyday but Esther hasn’t experienced that problem. She thanks God for her reliable teachers and she says that she prays for each teacher every day.

In an effort to try to give these teachers a small compensation for their work they have started a donut business on the side. Their goal is to mix up a 50 kg bag of flour everyday to make into donuts to sell to local markets. When school ends at 1 pm some of the staff and some of the parents get together and start mixing the dough, it’s quite a labour intensive operation. Health standards here are pretty much non-existent so it’s easy for anyone to start a business in any place. This one happens to be in a roofless shack off of the back of someone’s house. In order to keep the supply going they are working 7 days a week so today on Sunday afternoon we went as a family and joined them in the donut making venture.

These ladies are starting the tedious hand mixing process.

...don't forget the oil!

When the Mom’s group at our home church in Winnipeg decided to do a fund-raiser selling Valentine’s chocolates and offered to send the proceeds to one of our projects, Needs Care came to mind immediately. The funds are being used to increase their capacity with some necessary tools and we are looking into getting a fuel efficient stove for them. Who would have thought that buying Valentine’s for your sweetheart in Winnipeg could have an impact on these women in Lusaka? We are hoping they will be able to increase their business to offer some regular financial support to the volunteer teachers. Needs Care has named the income generation part of their business Needs Foods!

Here are some of the 'Dolnads' by Needs Foods

A small sampling of some of the finished product (original recipe)

Here’s the original recipe in case anyone wants to try this at home:

25 kgs of flour
4 boxes of baking powder
20 eggs
1 kilo of sugar
a few mugs of oil
a bucket or so of water

Mix and mix and mix until you have a gooey dough and then shape by hand and deep fry.

Much concentration is required when shaping the donuts.

John got a little carried away with stretching his donut shape and it turned into the outline of Africa.

We’re still experimenting with the recipe and this afternoon John mixed up a batch of donut batter using his sour dough starter – his dream is that his starter mix will live on after we depart Zambia!

Kids are the ultimate taste test and they all gave a thumbs up to the sour dough donuts.