Sri Lanka's First Dairy Innovation Kitchen Helps Chefs Do More For Less
Sri Lankan chefs have been delivering game-changing and delicious recipes to foodies right across the country, following the launch of Sri Lanka’s first dairy innovation kitchen in March.
Over the past few months, Anchor Food Professionals, Fonterra’s foodservice arm, has hosted chefs from international hotel chains to small bakeries in the new Colombo-based kitchen.
Fitted with world-class technology and stocked with high quality dairy ingredients, the innovation kitchen was established to trial new dairy solutions and develop novel recipes incorporating dairy.
So far, this has included the introduction of exciting recipes such as fresh cheesy buns and versatile dairy-infused sauces.
Kumar De Silva, Fonterra’s Associate Director for Foodservice in Sri Lanka and the Indian Subcontinent, said with more Sri Lankans eating out-of-home and on-the-run, the nation’s food and beverage companies are looking for new solutions and recipes to cater to this demand.
“We know chefs today need to do more with less, as Sri Lankans demand more convenient yet high-quality options.
“In addition, foodservice customers often request solutions that can be easily taught to incoming staff, but that don’t take away from the quality or wow-factor,” he explained.
Mr De Silva said what makes the concept work is the passionate team behind the kitchen bench.
“At the heart of the kitchen is a team of qualified chefs with decades of experience and a passion for providing only the best dairy solutions.
“With our resident Chef Jaime Aserappa, we work closely with our customers to identify key challenges to their business, and how we can tackle these challenges together using our world-class, delicious dairy solutions,” he said.
We know chefs today need to do more with less, as Sri Lankans demand more convenient yet high-quality options.
An example of Anchor Food Professionals’ recent work includes a project with a customer who was looking to create a novel cheese condiment.
The customer wanted a more cost-effective solution that worked as both a dip and a sauce but hadn’t been able to find the right formula. Anchor Food Professionals helped to develop a practical, easy but delicious way to accomplish this, using the Co-operative’s Anchor Slice-On-Slice Cheese and Anchor UHT milk.
Mr De Silva added: “The innovation kitchen has taken our foodservice business to the next level, bringing new potential for innovation as well as being really key in building relationships with our customers.”