Torun has a long tradition of making gingerbread which began in the thirteenth century. This craft, improved to perfection by successive generations, has made the town famous. At the turn of the nineteenth century, Gustaw Weese was a “gingerbread baron” who made the manufactory he had inherited into a modern plant. His baked products were exported to the United Kingdom, France, Turkey, China, Japan, Hawaii and Australia.

Today the Weese Factory, nationalised after WWII and transformed into a joint-stock company in the early 1990s, operates under the name Fabryka Cukiernicza Kopernik.

“We have been producing Torun gingerbreads for over 250 years and are the sole owner of Gustaw Weese’s original recipes,” says Jakub Kopczyński, the company’s marketing manager. The recipes were adapted to the requirements of automated production and consumer tastes, but the basic ingredients of the gingerbread dough and the baking method have not changed. We are using natural spices: clover, colander, pepper and nutmeg. They are ground in our plant and mixed in proportions that only a few people in the company know.

Gingerbread comes in all shapes: birds, animals, humans, but the most popular are the cloud-shaped cookies called Katarzynki . According to legend, six round gingerbread cookies were accidently melted into one when they were baked in preparation for St. Catherine’s Day, hence their name. Katarzynki are our flagship product,” says Jakub Kopczyński. “They get their unique taste from the large amount of spices that are added to make them.

Fabryka Kopernik handed over old baking tins and a 1960s oven, which produced over 70,000 tons of gingerbread, to the Torun Gingerbread Museum. The plant will supply five tons of dough for the annual gingerbread banking workshop. 

NELLY KAMIŃSKA