Stuffed inside four refrigerated sea containers in the bellies of the huge Soviet-era transport aircraft were tonnes of dough chilled to exactly -10C.
The first batch of batter for Tim Hortons doughnuts and bagels had arrived at the Canadian outpost at Kandahar Airfield after a 10,000-kilometre flight over the North Pole from the land of the double-double.
A team of six start-up experts from Tim Hortons in Canada will follow this weekend to help train 15 Canadians hired by the Canadian Forces Personnel Support Agency (CFPSA) to run the franchise.
The first coffee has already been test brewed in Tim's special coffee machines. If all goes according to plan, the first doughnuts should be served early next week.
A gala ribbon-cutting ceremony is planned for Canada Day, with Brigadier-General David Fraser presiding. Many of the 2,300 Canadians who are not at the front line or on sentry duty are expected to attend.
For several days, Canadian troops have been eyeing the Tim Hortons kiosk set up in a trailer on the base alongside such U.S. fast-food giants as Burger King, Pizza Hut and Subway.
"It's going to be a taste of Canada," said Warrant Officer Tim Turner of Edmonton. "It's what we have been talking about all the time."
Corporal Jarrit Turnell, also of Edmonton, joked it would not only be "a great morale boost for the boys. Now the [officers] will always know where to find us."
The plan is for Tim's to be open from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. The menu offered in the Afghan desert will be somewhat limited: coffee, iced cappuccino, bagels, muffins and seven kinds of doughnuts, but no chili, soup or sandwiches.
The currency of the Kandahar Airfield is U.S. dollars, but prices will be about the same as in Canada. Doughnuts will cost 75 cents, a bagel will be $1, and a large coffee $1.50.
"Afghanistan is not downtown Halifax or Montreal, so we have had to deal with some very special issues to get to this point," said Frank Cleyson, manager of the CFPSA in Kandahar, the franchise holder.
"Of course, it is a theatre of war here, with all that that involves. There was also the question of how we could get refrigerated containers into an airplane. Because Tim Hortons puts a lot of emphasis on quality control, another big concern has been how reliably can refrigeration work when it is 50C or 60C."
Another problem was how to transport the two trailers that are to serve as the outlet's bakery and sales kiosk. The U.S. Air Force flew a C-17 transport aircraft to the Canadian Forces base at Trenton, Ont., to pick up the trailers but could not use the loading equipment there. The flight to Afghanistan was scrubbed, and the trailers were driven to an air base in New Jersey, causing a two-week delay.
How Canada's iconic fast-food chain came to be in Afghanistan is a curious tale.
The idea was first mooted last fall by Canada's top soldier, General Rick Hillier, but it was still on the back burner early this year when a visiting journalist quoted Mr. Cleyson as saying Tim Hortons did not wish to be involved because an Afghan outlet did not fit its corporate plans.
"It was unfair to Tim Hortons. They did not deserve the rap, but that totally false story got the ball rolling," he said.
The CFPSA acquired the franchise "without the financial obligations that go with owning a franchise in Canada." While the company will make a small royalty on sales, "it is certainly not involved in this project to make money."
Canada is in Afghanistan until at least the spring of 2009. When the operation ends, the franchise that bears the name of one of Canada's iconic hockey stars will move on to wherever Canadian troops are next deployed.
Lieutenant-Colonel John Conrad, who worked with the CFPSA to bring the company to Afghanistan, credited support from Gen. Hillier and Tim Hortons' Paul House with making it possible.
"The plumbing and electricity are in place. Everything is almost ready to go," Lt.-Col. Conrad said.
Some members of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry battle group fear Tim's will prove so popular with the American, British and Dutch troops who share the base that the wait for a double-double will be too long.
Lt.-Col. Conrad's riposte: "The only thing worse than having allies is not having allies."
Hamming it up with a stetson on his head beside the Tim Hortons trailer, Warrant Officer Turner said he planned to be on hand on Canada Day to taste his first Afghan "coffee and toasted bagel with lots and lots of butter."
PUBLICATION: National Post
DATE: 2006.06.23
BYLINE: Matthew Fisher
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