Baking, Baking, Baking – Oi Oi Oi

Intro/Outro (00:04):

It takes a bit of a blend of art and science to get baking just right and having extra eyes, ears, and hands can make a big difference along the way. That’s where AB Maori, north America comes into play. We are the team behind industrial and artisan bakers that help optimize success. We’ll discuss more on this episode of the Oven Light, so let’s get going. Flip the switch.

Rick (00:31):

Alright everybody, welcome back to the Oven Light. I’m your host Rick Sack. Last time on our program as part of the 2025 calendar, last one of the year we had Kerwin Brown, longtime head of bma, the bakery equipment manufacturers and allies. He was on the program with us. This time we’re sitting down with somebody who’s kind of part of our family, an esteemed alum of the AB Maori Baking family. This guest spent four decades in the industry and was even part of a quartet of baking professionals, including some moving from down under to the US to Portland, Oregon to be exact. And they later revolutionized the American baking industry with the use of baking enzymes. He served as longtime head of bakery ingredients for AB Maori as well as the SVP of Exponential Innovation. We’re going to talk about that one. We got to explain this whole exponential piece, but oh, and you wouldn’t want to face this guy on the rugby pitch as well. I’ve seen some photos. Let’s welcome Barry Clayton to the Oven Light. Hey Baz, how you doing Barry?

Barry (01:33):

I’m doing well Rick. Pleasure to be here

Rick (01:35):

Man. We’re excited to have you on the program. And you know what, let’s just kind of lighten the mood. We have a program element called the Hot Pan, so kind of a series of quick hitting questions. So we’ll come right at it real quickly. Barry, morning routine, what baked good are you including at breakfast to get your day going?

Barry (01:54):

I’m a pretty simple fella, so my favorite is poached eggs on an English muffin.

Rick (01:59):

Man, I like that. I love the English muffin. I don’t think anybody’s said that in our almost 50 episodes now. English muffins are a good one. I do like crumpets. That’s got a thing too, right,

Barry (02:11):

Thing

Rick (02:12):

Too. Alright, so I got to ask you, you live up in the Pacific Northwest. Is there a good local bakery? Is there somebody that found that might even have some down under treats from New Zealand or Australia? I mean any specialties?

Barry (02:25):

To be honest, not so much. I haven’t found anything that replicates our typical baked goods in New Zealand. However, the Northwest clearly is a global leader in the baking industry. Great bakeries, Fran, Fran Bakery, a real diverse range of products. We have a small bakery, Ken’s bakery here, which has outstanding sourdough products, which I like to buy Grand Central and of course saves Killer Bread, famously was founded in the Great Northwest. So we’re not short of entrepreneurs and really good bakeries and good baked products

Rick (02:59):

And amazing to see how DKB has kind of evolved and they keep adding new products every year and what a great portfolio. All right, last question of the hot pan. When someone says baking in the US what do you think of first?

Barry (03:12):

Huge, huge, diverse, and I tend to think of sweetness. The American baked goods tend to be sweeter than we were used to. Coming from Australasia or from New Zealand or Australia, uk, Canada type products tend to not be quite as sweet, but large scale, very diverse and a little bit of sweetness.

Rick (03:35):

Awesome. All good pieces there. So hey, now that we’ve warmed up a little bit, let’s get to the nitty gritty. We’re going to talk about some deeper discussion here. So hey, let’s get the elephant in the room. Let’s get it out there in the open. Let’s talk about the big news first, congratulations, as I call ’em The four horsemen scheduled to be inducted entity A SB, the American Society of Baking’s Hall of Fame coming up next month in Chicago on February 18th. Tell us about this group. It was you, Gary Newman, Dwayne WTOs and Greg Worthington. I mean what a great legacy to talk about the industrial baking industry in the US and this group who had a big fixture as part of it.

Barry (04:13):

Yeah, it goes back, I remember clear as it was yesterday, sitting in a swimming pool, Greg Worthington swimming pool in Sydney, Australia where we felt that the big corporation was not aligned with where we thought the industry could go. And we dreamt up this name innovative serial systems and says, let’s give it a go.

Rick (04:29):

So wait, can we stop for a second? A swimming pool. Really? A swimming pool. This is how things, you always hear the back of a napkin, but did you have floaties on? What kind of shorts were you wearing? I mean was it a Speedo? No, we’re not going to go there. But Barry, that’s a pretty cool story. Swimming pool.

Barry (04:44):

Yeah, to be honest, what happened, we just finished a corporate retreat direction of the company wasn’t quite where we believed it should be going. There was major forest fires in Sydney and some of our homes were under threat. So we all met at Greg’s place and he had a nice swimming pool and we could see the fires in the distance and we got talking and we even got excited enough to come up, dream up this name and the rest is history.

Rick (05:10):

So you formed this group called ICS or Innovative Serial Systems back in 96, which was eventually bought out by AB Maori in 2005 and that kind of created a whole different dynamic, but the company that you guys created back, boy 30 years ago now has kind of stood and stood the test of time and is still kind of alive and well in what we call the me ma. Yeah,

Barry (05:35):

We understood many years ago, especially having expertise, Greg expertise and technology and enzymes and design and Gary and myself, master Bakers and we understood as bakeries come under a lot of pressure with the ingredient labeling, they had to be accurate and bakeries were trying to standardize labeling and we realized you cannot do that without standardizing the process. So we pioneered, to be honest, the use of heat transfer technology to understand really what’s happening through inside the loaf of bread. From the start to the finish through the baking process, we studied dough under a microscope to see what happens when you put dough through different types of divider systems. So we combined that with enzymes because we did have a passion early on. We would say to ourselves, why are we adding these chemicals to bread such as potassium bromate and azo di carbonide? And we knew enzymes formulated correctly with a process optimization approach could be a game changer and that was the foundation of the business.

Rick (06:40):

Now it’s ironic because ab Maori’s focus products for quarter one here in 2026 is all behind clean label. So it’s funny how some of these same conversations are still going on. You talked about some of those products, the bromates and there’s always the monos and dyes and things like that, but is it interesting to see that some of these things still have long-term legs?

Barry (07:03):

No, I think people, if you look at the consumer, they are going to be concerned about what they’re eating and they read labels. And I think the mistake early on was if people tried to remove some of this stuff without making sure the end product quality was equal to or better than having used the chemicals and that slowed change down. But over time technology’s got better. And certainly having an applications team that we put together at ICS was really the game changer. The team in the lab designing and test baking and then out in the field and having it applied was what got us there. But not surprising. It takes time to change an industry and to perfect and actually make sure that we are really getting the tolerance because the big disadvantage with enzymes versus chemicals is most of the chemicals aren’t really temperature affected so much by temperature versus enzymes which are very temperature sensitive. So therefore you have to be far more precise and make sure you control the process.

Rick (08:07):

That’s where a little bit of the science and the technology and all the knowhow comes in. So let me ask you this. So really topical here in the last couple weeks, the new dietary guidelines have come out for Americans, and I don’t know if you’re privy if you’ve seen the triangle kind of took a total inversion here and is now wide at the top with the milk and the bread, bread being at the bottom, the baked goods, dairy and meat and butter and tallow and all that kind of stuff. High on the list. So anything, you’ve been in the food industry a long time, the baking industry a long time. How do you feel about how, we don’t need to get too political, but what’s your observation as an expert in the field? I mean, does this stuff keep you up at night? Still

Barry (08:49):

Highly processed foods are under attack and what you define as highly processed and to be honest, even putting bread into one basket is misleading. And I think it’s misunderstood by a lot of these people. Writing legislation for example, there’s a fundamental difference between a sweet highly processed white loaf for bread versus a high grain, low sugar type product and say a Ken’s rye bread, which has zero sugar at long fermentation. Putting those all into one basket is quite misleading. So I think as an industry we need to do a better job of making sure that just because our products have high fiber, lots of grains, but we also balanced it out by not having high sugar, making sure that we are offering a balanced approach so that we actually reclaim the foundation of the food pyramid.

Rick (09:41):

Hey, let’s flash back to your early days in New Zealand, Australia. How did things kind of start out? I did a little bit of research, you had some time at Sero Ingredients, Goodman fielder and some others. How did you get your start and did you anticipate, I’m going to say decades, I won’t throw a number out, but decades ago that this would be your legacy. Now you’re a hall of famer to be, you’ve been in this baking industry for a long time, you certainly know a lot of people globally and internationally. Boy could you have predicted this?

Barry (10:13):

No, absolutely not. I come from a family of bakers, so my dad was a baker, a very, very good baker, good trainer. I think they pioneered a system called the Lulu System in baking, which is a training process. I actually wanted to go into the police force and I was accepted into the August intake. I wanted to get into February. So between I’d worked in the bakery at part-time after school, and so I worked in the bakery and between January and August my acceptance, I found out that I was earning $22,000 a year and the police force was going to offer me 14,000. So I

Rick (10:48):

Yeah, two thirds

Barry (10:49):

And I was enjoying the bakery, I was enjoying the competitiveness. It’s quite rewarding to have the passion to create something from raw ingredients and then see it come out. And we had a competitive bakery where you are all trying to outdo each other on who could produce the best product and it was very rewarding. But no, I never for a moment would’ve ever pictured myself in this position.

Rick (11:11):

Well, if you weren’t a good baker you would have really hard baguettes and you could use that maybe on the police force, right? I mean,

Barry (11:18):

Exactly.

Rick (11:19):

Alright, so let’s talk about the family. You talked about your dad as a baker, but you certainly are a proud father of four sons and you like to call ’em well number one son, number two son. It kind of reminds me, I think it was Charlie Chan, the TV show, but your family is incredible and help keep me straight on this. You’ve got four sons who all represented New Zealand’s national lacrosse team at the same time, so I can imagine as a broadcaster. Here we go. Clayton passes to Clayton over to Clayton to Clayton who scores Clayton to Clayton to Clayton to Clayton. I mean seriously.

Barry (11:57):

Yeah, a dad’s proudest moment. To be honest, the next best thing from playing for the All Blacks of course, but to see your sons who used to use sticks to beat each other as kids, but then to be on a field at Two World Cups, I think Andrews played at Three World Cups, but to see them wearing the black jersey and they do a haka before with the sticks and pretty great moment for a father to witness that and see all his four sons play together. And they were good lacrosse players having grown up in the United States and played college lacrosse.

Rick (12:30):

Well, let’s talk about that New Zealand rugby team called the All Blacks and the Haka and all that. For those that don’t really understand or maybe not aware, can you talk about what the haka is, what the All Blacks represent? Because there’s a sporting team now called the Savannah Bananas that certainly there’s a little bit of an entertainment factor, but the All Blacks have been doing this a long time. Can you talk about the haka, what is it? And then we’re going to talk about have you done it yourself?

Barry (12:59):

Well, I certainly would not refer to the Hakka as a dance and you hear people refer to it as a dance. The Hakka is basically a passionate confrontation with the opposition team telling you bring your best, we are bringing our best. And it’s a challenge, it’s from the Maori culture, but it’s done respectfully and it’s come across as entertainment, but it’s quite a serious, we are bringing our best, you better bring your best and a way to start the combat. And then of course after the combat, everyone’s friends and if you know rugby, it’s a very friendly after match and it’s a great sport. In fact, I’m about to repeat a second term of coaching high school rugby in Oregon. Here we start next month we’ve been recruiting, but just as far as the All Blacks, I’ve lost a little bit of the aura. And to be honest, if you follow the news three days ago the newish coach got fired, he won last year, he won 10 games and lost three. And that’s not good enough in New Zealand rugby and the position to replace him, it’s seen as bigger than the Prime Minister’s job. So yeah, rugby New Zealand is a very passionate about rugby. And of course at the current time, the spring box are an outstanding team and going to be hard to beat at the next World Cup. But New Zealand certainly bats above its weight with a population of only five and a half million people.

Rick (14:22):

So I take from that the hawk is kind of a stare down, but an action, it’s the pregame kind of like stink eye. But hey, we’re going to put a little something on you with that. And then I tell you what, one of my favorite all-time bumper stickers I’ve seen says, give blood, play rugby. So any truth to that one?

Barry (14:42):

Yeah, well it is certainly a tough sport, but it’s fast. And so I think a little misleading where people say, well you don’t wear helmets, but also technically you can only tackle or hit the guy that’s carrying the ball. Whereas in American football you can be blindsided, not even see it coming. So they’re both tough sports.

Rick (15:00):

Wow. I didn’t know you were coaching high school too, so I salute you for that because with a high school son playing lacrosse now I can appreciate what you do and what the students get from you. So hey. Alright,

Barry (15:13):

Let’s, I’ll just throw in just as part of that because your young son, number four, Johnny just came back from New Zealand. He was in Wellington playing at the Asia Pacific for New Zealand lacrosse and they had to come in the top four to qualify for the World Cup in Japan in 2027. And I’m proud to say that they came forth and so New Zealand lacrosse will be going to

Rick (15:35):

Japan. When is that? When is the Japan trip?

Barry (15:38):

2027. I’m not sure what month.

Rick (15:41):

Well we got the Olympics coming up the World Cup and now you got 2027 in Japan. Put it on the schedule. If you’re a sports fan, we’re going to lighten the mood. We’re going to go back to that hot pan for a second. So is it true, and this is very topical, we just talked about yes or no that at a company event you once stripped down, not all the way to do that Maori haka presentation.

Barry (16:03):

It’s not my proudest moment. In fact, my sons have reminded me, basically they had to go onto the Maori pars to be trained in the lacrosse. And one thing you’re not supposed to do when doing the harker is actually be drinking. And so I broke the golden rule and I guess one of my least proud moments where I was forced, almost forced into doing it was a great bakery manager, Bob Jacobson from Safeway was getting married at lunchtime in a Mexican restaurant and encouraged me to do the Harker in my underwear, which is probably not a good look,

Rick (16:36):

That ease fermentation will get us. But I will tell you that that is impressive and we know you’re passionate and thanks for explaining that. Alright, so here’s another one. I know the story, you told me a little bit about it and you clearly enjoy boating. The northwest has some beautiful sailing waters, lakes and such, but then there is that big Pacific coast, and I understand that you took a trip down the entire Pacific Coast. And tell me about that one. I mean, this is pretty cool stuff.

Barry (17:05):

Yeah, I’ve done it a couple of times. I’ve got a very good friend, an Irish mate, Dave Mar, and he’s a pretty good sailor. He had some friends that purchased a brand new 42 foot sailboat and had never sailed in their lives and they just looked at everything on YouTube and so they flew us up to Seattle and we sailed the boat down. And it was one of, I guess the interesting story was as we were getting first step into the real ocean with the real waves, both the husband and wife were as crook as anything and they commented, man, we didn’t see that on YouTube. But yeah, no, it was a great trip and come across the Columbia bar, which if anyone knows is one of the most dangerous bars to cross in the United States. Both times I’ve come across it, it was like glass, you could have water skied, but you’ve still got to know the channel. But you had a time. I do love being out on the ocean with the wind. And

Rick (17:53):

Do we call you skipper now or what? I mean

Barry (17:55):

No, I’m not that good. I call Dave Skipper.

Rick (17:59):

So Oregon, it’s known for its wines beyond Bread that we talked about. Any suggestions or are you a wine drinker? Is there a vintage or variety or a winery that you enjoy up there? What is it? Willamette, right?

Barry (18:12):

Yeah, Oregon’s very famous for its pinots. If you look at actually the similarity between New Zealand and Oregon, pretty similar. 42 above, 42 below, give or take. So opposite seasons, it’s a lot of wine makers come up here in the off season and vice versa. But the Pinots pretty much, I’m a little biased here because my son worked for Bill Foley, the Foley family, so the full Graces Foley family wines, they have just built an amazing new winery here. So if you ever get the chance Woolworth, the visit spectacular,

Rick (18:45):

We will check that

Barry (18:46):

You’ve got wineries like domain and serene, just the quality. It’s like you would think you’re somewhere in France when you go out into the Newburgh area to the wine country. It’s spectacular. So yeah. Yes, and we do enjoy a glass or two.

Rick (18:59):

Well, I guess that kind of begs the question. We never talked about it. How did you land in Portland anyways, coming from New Zealand and Australia? Was it because of that, the climate and some similarities or was it just luck of the draw or because of the baking market there or what?

Barry (19:15):

Yeah, I should be careful here because actually I was traveling over with Goodman fielder and I was staying in Portland. In fact, I was staying in downtown Portland and it was gray and miserable and I thought to who the hell would ever live here? It was like a cold town. And I thought, man, and then I came back and we met this gentleman, Bob Jacobson, who was the manager of the Safeway Bread bakery, and we worked in his plant and did some trials and then he invited us round home for a barbecue and he happened to live off this lake called Lake Oswego. He wasn’t on the lake, but he was just off. And he took us for a cruise round and I thought, man, I could live here. And so my wife had only been to the United States once before and we stayed and I was pretty, I’m pretty thrifty. So we stayed in close to a Motel six type

Rick (20:03):

Way to appeal to your wife on that one. Good job.

Barry (20:05):

Yeah, no air conditioning, but we wanted to go to Disney.

Rick (20:07):

You guys are still married though, right? So okay, good.

Barry (20:11):

At this stage we wanted to go to Disney World and the Epcot Center, et cetera. So that was the only trip she’d ever been here. And when I suggested, man, we’ve got this opportunity to go and live in the United States for a couple of years, she was pretty lukewarm, but there was no risk to us. We were being transferred. So we thought what a great opportunity for two years. And clearly when we decided to start the company, we did the pros and cons. And I tell people, and this is as true as I sit here, if we ever had said to ourselves, if things go really well, you’ll be stuck here for you could be for 10, 20 years. I don’t think we would’ve taken the risk. It would’ve been that would’ve been a step too far, however, down the track, which now we could go back and live in New Zealand tomorrow, but we’ve found the United States be great country challenging at this time, of course. But everywhere you go, if you look for it, there’s good, great people and we love living here. And I think a mistake that a lot of people from outside the us, they look at the US and they refer to it as this one country. It’s a little bit what I said about bread. You refer to bread as one, but it’s not that the US could be five different countries in one. We’ve got different cultures, we’ve got different environments and people and thought processes. And so yeah, I like it. We like it. It’s pretty cool.

Rick (21:30):

Well, you know what, you bring up an interesting point, five countries in one. So this summer is the hundredth anniversary of Route 66. So my high school age son, he’ll be a senior going into a senior year. We’re going to take that trip and drive all the way to the Santa Monica Pier where it ends from Chicago. So have you ever made that drive or seen some of that? I haven’t. And we’re so excited about the culture, the things that you’re just going to just happenstance come across.

Barry (21:55):

I have not, I’ve done little bits of it, but you probably know Joe has a gl, one of those Mercedes sprinter vans and she loves to get out and we get out and we do road trips down to California. We’ve been over to Montana. I mean this country, you could travel every day of the year and never see all of it. There’s so much to explore. So yeah,

Rick (22:17):

That’s cool. Well hey, quick shout out to your wife, Joe. She’s great and she keeps things in check. So hey, let’s talk about your career a little bit more here. If you had two or three highlights from all the years in baking, is there one or two that stands out that you’re like, wow, or is it going to be this upcoming hall of fame celebration where all that hard work 30 plus years ago coming in and really changing the environment for the US baking industry?

Barry (22:42):

Yeah, I think the Hall of fame is going to be the icing on the cake. However, in fairness, I would be accepting it on behalf of all the people that deserved that got us there. So this is not about me or Gary or Greg. This is about a company we formed. And so the highlight for me was the great people. I talked about your Rachel and Carey’s in the lab and your Jim Boes and Jeff Owler and the team, the Jose Lopez’s, the West knows the Troy and there’s so many of them. David Webster’s,

Rick (23:15):

You can’t name ’em all here, but you’re doing a pretty good job on,

Barry (23:18):

I’d like to name them all because they’re all equally as important. And every one of them gave up, took risk with a small startup, with a small company. And I look back and I’m just blown away by how we were able to get the best of the best. And they’re a group of people that didn’t all want to be the boss because the problem all this team, they’re so good that each one of them could be the leader and there’s just not enough room for 10 leaders. So what we build with that group of people still to this day blows me away that we were able to achieve that and what a great team and very proud of them.

Rick (23:56):

Well, you talked about icing on the cake. I’m going to give you a quote that I heard long time ago. This goes back over 35 years ago, I think, when the Giants beat the bills on the Super Bowl. And I remember a quote, Otis Anderson, he was a running back with the Giants, made his hay with the cardinals, but after they won the Super Bowl, somebody said, was this just the icing on the cake? He goes, yeah, it was icing on the cake, but the cake was baked a long time ago, baby. And that’s a little bit of your comment, so I love that. But here’s another quote that I’m especially fond of and it’s personal. You still even have it on your LinkedIn site online. You say we’re here for a good time, not a long time. Why does that resonate? I’m going to read it one more time and it’s on his LinkedIn page. Check it out. We’re here for a good time, not a long time.

Barry (24:43):

Yeah, I think it’s a reflection. If you ask any one of my sons, they would immediately say, that’s what I say to them. And life is too short to have enemies. It’s too short not to smile and get on with people and make friends and reality hits a good example. We’ve got the Markowski, the Bruce s or Jose Lopez unfortunately passed away way too young. And they’re a great example that we are all on this earth for such a small minute point amount of time in the scheme of the world of time. And it’s just not worth stressing the small stuff. Worry about the stuff you can control and can affect, but life is short and enjoy it, enjoy every moment. And it’s not about, I think we all took too much focus on the end instead of enjoying the ride along the way. So yeah, it’s a bit about what it’s about.

Rick (25:37):

There’s some great words of wisdom. Me, I tell you what, you should rewind that and listen to that 32nd piece of advice. It’s great. Barry, we’re getting close to wrapping up, but is there anything else out there you want to talk about? Have you read a book? Is there another quote or some other sort of inspiration for baker’s out there they can latch onto you based on your awesome career that you kind of want to impart? Here’s your chance.

Barry (26:02):

Well, first I’d say if a baker from New Zealand can make the USA Hall of Fame, anything’s possible. I mean, chase your dream. The thing I would say, and I see people going into businesses and the thing, my piece of advice would be when you go into business, go into business to achieve and demonstrate your passion and be the best of the best and the money will be the outcome of you being successful in that. But yet too many people I think go in thinking, man, I can make a lot of money. And I can honestly say I don’t recall one day when the three of us decided to take the biggest risk of our lives and start this company. Not one of us said, man, we could make some money, but we were all passions, man. We could take chemicals out of the industry and revolutionize it.

(26:49):

We could change the world, we could change bread. And that was the passion. And so my word of wisdom is finances will be the outcome of doing something great that you’re passionate about, that you’re good at your love and you certainly need your family support. You talk about Joe, she raised my four boys because I was away so much. I had to travel extensively, three and a half million miles on United Airlines just to visit the bakeries and during the bakeries at three in the morning, but was passionate and the outcome was good that we required by associated British foods. That would be my words of wisdom. The other thing people say to me, I say, why would you leave New Zealand and come to the United States? I mean, New Zealand is a beautiful country and yes it is, but there’s 300 million more people eat bread in the United States and New Zealand, so I can do that math. So if you’re going to be successful and be good at what you do, this was a good country to do it. And

Rick (27:45):

You went for the big bite and it was a great bite and one loaf at a time, right? You’ve changed the industry. And for that, Barry, we have to thank you. Thanks for your service to the industry and being passionate and being who you are. And we’re looking forward to celebrating you in February at a SB. It’s going to be awesome.

Barry (28:05):

Thank you very much.

Rick (28:06):

And for now everybody, that’s it for today’s the Oven Light. Great podcast today with Barry. We’ll be back in the future for now, the switch is off the oven, light is off. Thanks for listening. And here’s to a great 2026 together.

Intro/Outro (28:19):

We hope you’ve enjoyed this episode of the Oven Light. Until next time, when we discuss more about the wonderful world of baking, technology trends and more, the switch is officially off. Goodbye for now. See you next time.