M. K. Swamy & Sons, Bakers, Confectioners & General Merchants, is one of Belgaum�s oldest establishments. It is at least a 100 years old if not more, and is located in Church Street of the Camp area, a place that bears some familiarity with R. K. Narayan�s Malgudi Days right down to a small post office around the corner. In Belgaum, the shop is simply known as Swamy Bakery. And there are five partners to the business, all named Swamy, with Jayant the son of one of them running the place from the time it opens at 5.30 a.m. to only shut at 9 p.m.

They start baking bread from 1 o�clock in the morning and open the sales for bun and pav at 5.30, when the breads ate steaming hot. But this bakery is not known for its bread alone. The savoury items like chicken, mutton and vegetable pattices, cutlets and croissants, the fish cutlets, all of which cost between Rs. 6 and 12, and the biscuits and cakes are what draws in the crowds. Residents of the area are attracted to the little bakery by the aroma of pattices and cutlets that wafts out of the smoking chimney on the roof. And they come and queue to buy them less stocks run out.

The mutton cutlet, which is Swamy Bakery�s oldest product, is the most popular item of all. It sells about 150 pieces a day. Which is a lot, considering this is one sleepy part of Belgaum, and most shops and houses down shutters in the afternoon and people take a nap. The mutton pattice, in fact, which is another best-seller at the bakery, only comes out at 3. It goes like the proverbial hot cakes! And the fish cutlet is just as good. Swamy Bakery uses the king fish to make its cutlet which is bought in the local market. �We are the fourth generation Swamys,� says Jayant. The bakery�s clientele is also several generations old. Most people come in to make small purchases and like to hang around the place because it is also a provision store with an old world charm and perhaps the mainspring of the local gossip. Belgaum�s Camp area makes all its purchases here. You can pick up oats, breakfast cereals, sauces, jams, pickles, cheeses, butter, milk, biscuits � the packaged variety and Swamy�s own, Costa�s tinned meats and fish products from Goa, colas and soft drinks, masala powders.

Two doors down Church Street is where the actual bakery and confectionery is. A sign outside says the establishment was started in 1919, or is it 1819, the manager there, Alex Joseph, does not know. He has been in Swamy�s employ for 19 years and is responsible for the production of all the pattices, chops, croisants, biscuits, cakes, nankhatais that are made here. The workers come to the bakery at 9 at night and work starts at 1.30 a.m. They are there till 6 next evening and work in shifts. The worked in hot and cramped circumstances, dressed in shorts and t-shirts, their hands automatically kneading the dough for the pattices and cakes, and just as easily pinching the meat and vegetable stuffing by the side and pushing it into the savoury to make a small envelope before laying it out onto a baking tray and sending it over to the oven.

The ovens are all wood-fired, and the men weilding the long handle shovels to put batter mixture into the deep heat and bring out cakes, biscuits, breads and savouries, are experienced hands who are unbothered by the heat. They know just how long to keep the mutton pattice inside so that the savoury comes out crisp and shiny to the touch, yet soft, moist and well cooked inside. The operation goes on and on, with relay runners bearing trays aloft and dashing between the bakery and the provision store. It is a familiar sight and only lends to the Malgudi Days-like feel about the bakery and its quaint location. Joseph rattles off the names of the biscuits, cakes and breads that are baked at Swamy Bakery. �We do shrewsbury and coconut biscuits, nankhatais and kharis. In cakes, we make plum, fruit and plain sponge cakes. We also do cup cakes, what you call mava cakes in Bombay and Pune. And we bake brown bread, wholewheat, the maida pav, buns, hot dog rolls, pizza bases. And, yes, in the pattice section, we also do an egg pattice that is very nice.� Swamy Bakery is naturally proud of its shrewsbury biscuits. �We make them in pure Amul butter,� says Jayant. Are they as good as the Kyani bakery�s shrewsbury biscuits from Pune? He hesitates, then replies honestly, �I won�t say we are better than them. But they make their shrewsbury biscuits very crispy. Like Parle biscuits.�