Processing belongs near where the food is grown.
Why this exists
Farms that grow well grow variously. A rotation with beans in it feeds the soil, breaks disease cycles and gives you six or eight things to sell instead of one, in quantities no processing line is set up for. The agronomy improves and the invoice doesn’t.
Almost every piece of food manufacturing in Europe is built the other way, around one crop and a run long enough to justify the changeover. That’s an efficient answer to a question farms have stopped asking.
So we built the other kind of line. Small enough that a single field is a viable run, equipped for grain and bean flour, and set up to change blend between runs rather than once a year.
Maasboulevard 100, Rotterdam. A mixer, an extruder with bronze dies, and a drying room that runs for 24 to 36 hours at low temperature, with flour from a milling partner.
That’s the whole of it, and it’s the point. Nothing about the equipment is unusual. What’s unusual is the scale it’s set at and the willingness to change what goes into it.
Visits are by appointment, so call ahead.
What’s come off it
BOONA, a bean and grain pasta for hospital and care kitchens, now in service at a number of Zuid-Holland hospitals and care facilities at around 100 kg a week, through Het Nieuwe Nassen, TotaalVERS and St. Franciscus.
A lupin pasta for Lekker Lupine. A high protein pasta for De Biesterhof, made from their own wheat, spelt and fava beans, for hospital catering and the Radboud Nijmegen canteen. And a pastina soup mix of our own, almost ready for market.
Why we stay this size
The line is sized to change between runs. That isn’t a stage we’re growing out of, it’s the whole capability. Scale it up and it needs one crop and a long run, and then we’re no use to the people we built it for.
Being this size is what lets a single field be a viable production run, a blend follow what was actually harvested, and a shape exist that no standard die cuts. It’s why we can work to a season rather than a forecast.
It also means that when you call, you get the person who runs the line. The answer about whether your crop will work comes from someone who’ll be standing next to the extruder when it does.
Sean Patrick, Founder and Product Lead.
I’m a food processing and industrialisation specialist. I build the manufacturing route for crops and ingredients that don’t yet have one.
Before Gabanna, I spent seven years in international development working on agricultural recovery and rural livelihoods in West Africa. I completed a master’s in Agrarian, Food and Environmental Systems at the International Institute of Social Studies, Erasmus University Rotterdam, and an advanced master’s at Radboud University Nijmegen.
What we hold ourselves to
We say what we can’t do before you’ve spent time on it. Dry goods only, no distribution, and an honest answer in the first call if the crop won’t work.
We tell you where our certifications actually stand. FSSC 22000 is in progress and we’d rather you knew that now.
We don’t make products we wouldn’t put in front of our own families.
Where this goes
Gabanna is the first Maker Station in Europe. Green Banana Food B.V. is building more of them, close to other harvests in other places, on the same principle that processing belongs near where food is grown rather than three countries away.
We’re working towards the next one in Uganda, bringing localised processing to African markets.
Come and see it.
We host group visits and pasta workshops in our events space, and we’re glad to hear from volunteers and food enthusiasts. Call ahead to arrange a visit, or invite us to your food and biodiversity event.
A Maker Station in Rotterdam, making pasta from regenerative harvests.
Contact
Maasboulevard 100
3063 NS Rotterdam
The Netherlands
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