Print Issue: December 19, 2002

Men's Club On A Roll - Holiday Treat A Sweet Success For Snellville Bakers

Dave Jones removes the cooked nut rolls from the convection oven, one of the new ovens purchased to help enhance the production process. The convection oven can cook three batches for every one in the 72-inch commercial ranges. (Photos by Michael Alexander) The hands of Jerry Weber knead the dough in preparation for its first rising. Weber has participated in the men's club polish nut roll making for the past seven years at St. Oliver Plunkett Church, Snellville. Michael Schmitz, left, and Skip Davis roll and stack the dough after it is removed from a room following its second rising. Wayne Champion, left, and Larry Dunn prepare the containers of butter, eggs, milk, sour cream and vanilla, some of the ingredients used to make a batch of dough. Both men have served with the men's club's "Great Chefs of Snellville" for five years.

By Erika Anderson, Staff Writer

SNELLVILLE - The kitchen at St. Oliver Plunkett Church is covered in flour.

It's on the floor. It's on the counters. And it's not just inanimate objects that have been affected. Also covered in white are the dozen or so men who have gathered on the chilly morning of Dec. 7 for an annual tradition that combines service, fellowship and sweet treats that parishioners look forward to all year long.

For seven years, the St. Oliver Plunkett Men's Club has met in early December to make Polish nut rolls. With the frenzied chaos of Santa's helpers, some wearing green golf shirts emblazoned with the men's club logo, and aprons, they have formed a system - a tried and true recipe for success that has led to the increased sale of the nut rolls each year they have been baking.

At a men's club meeting in 1996, Tom Witts and Sid Sartor were reminiscing about the holiday traditions that they both remembered from their youth living in northeastern Pennsylvania. In their area, several Polish churches baked and sold Polish nut rolls. Witts had a copy of the recipe, and a St. Oliver Plunkett tradition was born.

Sartor remembers well the first years of nut-roll making.

"The first year was a big learning process," he said, adding that as an Italian, he often makes dishes such as homemade ravioli and pizelli. "We had men that had never been in the kitchen before. We wrote everything down. It's not chaos now, but it was in the beginning."

The first year, the group sold around 350 of the nut rolls.

This year, the men made 750 rolls, which adds up to 50 dozen eggs, 30 lbs. of flour, 200 lbs. of sugar and 125 lbs. of nuts.

Men's club president Paul Ruder was among the few men who arrived at the church at 4:30 a.m. to begin making the dough for the rolls.

"It's an all-day affair. We used to get here later, but after cooking them, they take an hour to cool, and we can't put them into bags until they're cool," he said, adding that in the early years, the men would be there until 1 or 2 a.m. Now it's more sensible, Ruder said, and the day isn't quite as long.

The process is a baker's assembly line. Some men prepare the dough, some the dry ingredients, such as flour, sugar and yeast, some the wet ingredients like eggs and vanilla, while others mix them together, using an industrial mixer. Other men work on the filling - a nut mixture that combines walnuts, condensed milk, vanilla and sugar - which, when finished, resembles a gigantic bowl of oatmeal. From there, others make the rolls, spreading the nut mixture onto the flattened dough and rolling them, similar to a burrito. They bake for 20 minutes in one of four ovens, spreading the delicious scent throughout the church.

Men's club member Don Chesney, who brought his 12-year-old son, Sam, along for the day, said that even with the chaotic state of the kitchen, the men know what they're doing.

"Some of these guys do this every year," he said. "They've got it down to a science."

It's not just the delicious nut rolls - that bake into a golden brown - that result from the annual day of baking. At $5 a roll, the desserts raised around $3,500, minus the cost of baking, for the parish. The money will be given to the Boy Scouts and the St. Oliver Plunkett youth group.

Besides the obvious results, there is the overwhelming benefit of camaraderie. The sweet-smelling kitchen is filled with the sounds of laughter. The men talk about their wives, their children, the SEC championship game that the Georgia Bulldogs will be playing later that night.

Sartor said that the fellowship is his favorite ingredient.

"The best part is when we start to wind down and everyone is tired, but we're still talking to each other," he said.

Bill Schneider, the self-proclaimed "mix-master," had been slaving in front of the huge silver mixer all morning, but said that the day was an important part of holiday celebrations.

"We have fun back here," he said. "It's fun being with the guys. This is part of Christmas. I told my family, until we make the nut rolls, it doesn't feel like Christmas."

Rolling the dough into the large flat circles, Mike Schmitz gets the award for being the most flour-covered. A veteran baker, he said he had six loaves of bread rising at home while he was preparing the nut rolls at the church for the first time.

"My wife calls me Billy the Baker," he said. "I love to bake. This is my first time making the nut rolls. My wife and I just joined the parish last January and everyone raved so much about the nut rolls, I had to see what it was all about."

Though few of the men are Polish, making the Polish treat has given them all honorary citizenship.

"At about 11:30 tonight, we'll all be doing the polka because we're done," Sartor said.

"On March 17th, we're all Irish," Ruder said. "Today, we're all Polish."