(VOVworld) – Mining areas in Quang Ninh province have made bread just for coal miners. It is called miners’ bread.

(Photo: VOV)

Visiting Ha Lam coal mine, one of the biggest and oldest coal mines in Quang Ninh, we follow some coal miners to a tidy, well-kept baker.  

The 6 bakers there work 3 shifts a day around the clock, turning out 2,000 loaves a day to serve thousands of workers.

Nguyen Thi Thuan, the head of the bakery team, said: “The bakers here make the bread wholeheartedly. They consider serving workers to be serving their family. They want to ensure food safety and hygiene and provide good nutrition so the coal miners will be strong enough to work.”

(Photo: VOV)

It’s a meticulous process to produce a delicious loaf of bread - from choosing the ingredients to kneading the dough to baking the loaves.

“To create delicious bread, kneading the dough is the most important step. We must do it carefully until it becomes smooth. If we create smooth dough, the finished loaves will look more beautiful,” said Thuan.

(Photo: VOV)

It’s called miners’ bread because it’s made for miners and each coal miner receives a snack consisting of a loaf of bread and two containers of milk before entering the mine.

Tran Thi Bich Hong, a forewoman for the Ha Lam Coal Company, says the bread-making steps have been automated to save human labor, increase productivity, and produce uniform loaves.

Hong added: “Since 2008 we’ve been using electricity to bake the bread instead of burning coal so the bakers don’t have to work so hard and the product quality has greatly improved.”