Inside Goa’s 95-YO Family Bakery Still Baking With Woodfire & Tradition

In 1930, Andre Mascarenhas returned to Goa from Mumbai with a dream and a few treasured recipes. His years at Mumbai’s Iranian bakeries had taught him much — from perfecting the multi-tiered wedding cake to mastering buttercream. Back in Goa, in the pastel-hued lanes of Fontainhas, he founded a bakery, Confeitaria 31 De Janeiro.

Today, the storied bakery is run by Andre’s grandson, Warren Mascarenhas, along with his mother, Gletta. Over the decades, it has become a cherished landmark, etched into Panaji’s culinary memory.

Two things distinguish Confeitaria: a swarm of people queuing up to get their bakes — these days, however, the crowds are also composed of those who just want to get a glimpse of the bakery’s new avatar after its renovation; and a tempting aroma. 

Youngsters are interspersed with 80 and 90-year-olds, Warren shares, pointing to the latter being the loyal customers who’ve kept flocking to the bakery since his grandfather’s time. “My grandfather was in his late twenties when he opened the bakery," he explains, sharing that in addition to bread and a handful of Goan staples — festive plum cakes, pinag (a sweet made with rice, coconut and jaggery), Madeiran Bolo de Mel (honey cake), his grandfather introduced the wine biscuits. This intrepidity meant long nights, often sleeping in the bakery itself as he attempted to perfect the menu.

Warren grew up on these stories of his grandfather’s passion. Stories are not the only thing he has to rely on, though. “We still have customers in their eighties and nineties coming in and telling us of how my grandfather would give them an extra cookie or cake,” he shares.

Then there’s the story of a neighbour who, as a boy, helped carry wood into the bakery in exchange for the trimmings of Swiss rolls, and the customers who tell Warren about how his grandfather would sneak buttercream into waiting hands through a small hole in the window screen.

The fact that there are customers who keep coming back — to buy their favourites and to reminisce — is a success for the family.

Marking out a space for traditional Goan favourites

Cooking runs in the Mascarenhas family DNA. Its members bring a sort of alchemy to the kitchen. In fact, when Andre passed away, it was this love for their legacy and their culinary ingenuity that kept the family going.

Gletta, for one, recalls many afternoons spent sifting through yellowing recipe books, converting archaic measurement scales into modern ones, translating Portuguese ingredients into English, and attempting to crack her father-in-law’s culinary secrets.

But the idea, through the years, hasn’t just been to stay true to tradition, but also to introduce winks of change into the process.

This is reflected in the revamp that Confeitaria 31 De Janeiro has undergone; you’ll feel you're walking into an Instagram page. Really. “We get a lot of the young crowd too, and so we’ve tried to cater to everybody while also maintaining the old world charm,” Warren explains.

Elaborating on how they were keen that the renovations don’t interrupt the existing old school ambience of the bakery, he shares, “Everything was wooden inside. For years, we couldn’t renovate because of the mud walls, and the structure remained untouched. But in 2021, we did a renovation. We strengthened the columns and got the place redone.”

A sort of déjà vu creeps up on him as he manages the bakery. “I remember when I was a child, I would sit at the counter and count the change during my vacations. I was always in charge of answering the phone.”

Warren joined his mother in operations after completing his hotel management degree. He was excited about carrying on the legacy.

While the classics remain untouched, he’s enjoyed creating everything from a Bailey’s cheesecake pastry to a wood-fired twist on the Basque cheesecake.

The wood fire gives Panaji its breakfast

The wood-fired oven at Confeitaria 31 De Janeiro is large enough for a man to enter. Since 1930, the 20 feet x 20 feet space has been where breads and puffs are baked in the mornings and cakes and puffs later in the day.

But it’s not just the wood-fire technique that makes the bakes special; Gletta explains, “We don’t use preservatives. That means a shelf life of just a few days, but also a flavour and freshness you can’t get anywhere else.” 

There’s also a third aspect that renders the bakery its success, Gletta shares. The staff at Confeitaria 31 De Janeiro have been around for decades; they know the business better than anyone else. “My father-in-law died at a very young age. But we know the staff who worked with him back in the day. A few of them are in their fifties now; they were very young when my father-in-law first started working with them. They never left.”

One of the first recipes that Gletta had stumbled upon in the recipe book was bol sans rival. Crunchy, buttery and nutty is how most describe the large rectangular cake, which is characterised by French buttercream sandwiched in between layers of meringue.

“It was the first recipe we tried, and it was amazing. It came out perfectly. My father-in-law used to put the cashew nuts in the wood fire so that they would get burned slightly. That used to give the cake a crispiness. That was the taste I wanted to achieve,” she shares.

Some of the best-selling menu items at Confeitaria 31 De Janeiro are bebinca (a layered cake made primarily from eggs, coconut, sugar, ghee and flour), doce de grao (Goan fudge), poye (staple Goan bread), serradura (Portuguese dessert made using whipped cream and biscuit), and the rum balls.

And the next time you’re in Goa, you’ll know exactly where breakfast is waiting!

All pictures courtesy Warren