Blueberry Pie in Maine

Love blueberry pie? Find pie nirvana at the Quietside Cafe in Southwest Harbor, Maine.

by Bakery Boy

Blueberry pie in Maine stands tall, like this piece from the Quietside Cafe in Southwest Harbor.

Like many people, I went to coastal Maine to eat lobster and didn’t know until I got there that I’d also entered blueberry-pie-lovers’ heaven. And like a hungry bear that wanders into town, I gorged on both delicacies during a blissful summer visit several years ago. The memory still lingers. My personal benchmark for terrific lobster and transcendent blueberry pie remains Mount Desert Island, home of the rugged Acadia National Park, the famous port town of Bar Harbor, and the lesser-known fishing village of Southwest Harbor, where I believe I achieved pie nirvana.

The art of pie-making extends to sign-making at the Quietside Cafe.

More recently (this summer) my friend Teresa vacationed in Maine with her husband and son and confirmed that it remains a sort of Paradise, Elysian Fields, Valhalla, Shangri-La, Avalon, and Kingdom Come of pie. A loyal follower of the Bakery Boy Blog, Teresa returned home to Alabama raving about those pies.

Though small, the Quietside Cafe can pack in a huge pie-loving crowd.

“At the Quietside Café in Southwest Harbor we ate terrific blueberry pie that was at least four inches high in the center,” she said. “I’ve never seen a fruit pie that huge! They had a good-looking chocolate pie and some other pies too, but we were on a blueberry pie quest and didn’t try anything else, though now I wish we had. At another restaurant, The Captains Galley at Beal’s Lobster Pier, we found blueberry pie made from the same small but really sweet berries that grow in Maine. The crusts at both were slightly sweet and insanely flaky. Those two places—less than a mile apart—serve two of the best pies I’ve ever eaten. They really know how to make ’em up there!”

Now I know two things: One, Maine still holds a deservedly pie-and-mighty place in the universe of pie. Two, I should get back there as soon as possible. Make that three: I have a fresh excuse to call Downeast Maine pie makers and chat.

Piemaker Frances Reed and her daughter Marlena.

FRANCES REED, PIE QUEEN After just three rings I got an answer and asked, May I speak to whoever makes those great blueberry pies at the Quietside Café please?

 

“That’s me,” said Frances Reed, the perky Pie Queen of Downeast Maine, in an accent that recalls her West African roots rather than her husband Ralph Reed’s hometown of Tremont, a hamlet a few miles down the road from the café they own together.”

It’s a pleasure to meet you Frances. What is it about your pies that makes people rave about them?

“The berries have a lot to do with it,” Frances said. “Blueberries grown here in Maine are small but very sweet. They’re loaded with natural sugar so you don’t have to add much processed sugar. You can really taste the difference. We order berries from local growers about four times a week to keep a fresh supply coming.”

And the impressive height of your pies, how do you achieve that?

A whole blueberry pie at Quietside Cafe goes for $27.

“For one thing, I use a lot of filling, at least seven cups of blueberries in each 10-inch pie. To keep it from spilling out as it bakes, the crust has to be pinched tight along the edge.”

A good crust is key to any successful pie. What’s your secret?

“It’s just that—a secret! I’ll tell you this, I make it fresh every day. Pastry dough for pie has to be fresh to work right.”

Blueberry Pie a la Mode.

But the price is no secret, right?

“A slice is $5.75. Served with ice cream, $6.75. A whole pie, $27. About two year ago we started shipping pies all over the country to people who just had to have them, even though the mailing cost is $138 to send two pies overnight in a refrigerated box!”

What other pies to you make?

In fall, Quietside Cafe pies include pumpkin, sweet potato, and chocolate espresso pecan.

“Apple pie is another big seller in summer, the busy season here. In fall we make pecan, pumpkin, and sweet potato pies too. We also bake brownies and cookies. We’re closed from partway through November to partway through April, when it’s cold and rainy here and fewer people visit.”

You don’t sound like you’re from Maine.

“I was born in Ghana in West Africa and grew up there, went to school in London, and lived in Germany for many years. I married Ralph 25 years ago—it’s our anniversary this month—while he was in the U.S. Army. He was in the service for 25 years and then we moved here to his home area. We’ve owned Quietside Café for 14 years.”

What else does the Quietside serve?

“Lobster, crab, pizza, burgers, chowder, soups, sandwiches, salads, ice cream. It’s a small place with six tables and a counter inside, plus five picnic tables and a row of stools outside. In summer the line to get in is pretty long. Just about everyone finishes with pie. I probably make 50 to 60 pies every day.”

Are you having fun?

Frances, Marlena, Ebony, and Ralph Reed at their Quietside Cafe.

“Oh yes! We work hard, but we have a great time. Ralph is here with me and our two daughters practically grew up in the café. Ebony is now an Airman Second Class in the U.S. Air Force, working in logistics, and Marlena is an Army ROTC Cadet.”

What do they want most when they come home?

“Pie, of course!”

 

Great pie...and much more.

WHERE Quietside Café, 360 Main Street, Southwest Harbor, ME 04679 (14 miles southwest of Bar Harbor through the scenic Acadia National Park on Mount Desert Island)

 

 

WHEN Open most days 11 a.m.-10 p.m. from late April through mid-November (all subject to change)

INFO Call 207-244-9444 or click here for the Quietside Café’s Facebook Page

 

Lobster boats dot the Maine coast.

AREA INFO Get more from National Park Acadia (a commercial site maintained by Downeast Directions, not the actual National Park’s site); from Captain D’s Ports Downeast; and from the Maine Office of Tourism (call 1-888-624-6345)

 

Beal's Lobster Pier in Southwest Harbor.

HONORABLE MENTION According to my pie-questing pal Teresa, the blueberry pie at The Captains Galley at Beal’s Lobster Pier, three-quarters of a mile from Quietside Café, is also among the best on pie-intensive Mount Desert Island, which we’ve taken to calling Mount Dessert Island for good reason. I missed reaching the owners because they’d already closed and headed south for the winter. My suggestion: Try pie at both places—and any others you find in the area—then decide for yourself.

SHARE YOUR FAVORITE PIE? If you’ve found nirvana-inducing pie in Maine or anywhere else, leave a comment below and share the details with the Bakery Boy Blog.

Brick Street Cafe, Greenville, SC

“Even I don’t know the secret recipe for my sweet potato pie and sweet potato cake,” says ukulele-strumming restaurateur and baker Sara Wilson.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Sara Wilson serenades a sweet potato pie at her Brick Street Cafe. Photos by Bakery Boy.

Some of the best sweet potato pie and sweet potato cake you’ll ever taste comes from Brick Street Café, an adventuresome restaurant with a bakery in its basement in Greenville, South Carolina. Just don’t ask owner Sara Wilson for the recipe, because it’s so secret even she doesn’t know it. “I know absolutely everything about everything else in my restaurant and my bakery,” Sara says firmly, adding as an aside that the two-level brick structure with squeaky wooden floors in the West End Historic District was originally a belt factory. “But I don’t know the secret mixture used in the two desserts we’re best known for.”

This historic-district building once held a belt factory.

Here’s why, a story that has become a running joke for family members and Brick Street Café employees alike. Sara tells it while lounging on a garden-like back porch that serves as a waiting area, a break room, and her de facto office as she strums a ukulele and smiles, carefree clues that she’s not particularly bothered by being left out of this well-guarded secret.

"The sweet potato cake has practically an entire sweet potato pie mixed into it," Sara says.

“My husband Jim, who is a cabinet builder, got a recipe for sweet potato pie filling from one of his aunts,” Sara explains. “He comes here about three times a week to whip up big batches of the basic mixture. I’ve tried and tried to get him to tell me what all’s in it, so I can make it myself. But he always says—tongue in cheek, I think—‘No way! If you had that, you wouldn’t need me around anymore!’ ” So keeping the mixture mysterious is a form of husband-job-security for Jim. “The funny thing is,” she says, “for 15 years I’ve been taking all the credit for our most popular desserts, even though I couldn’t make them without Jim and his aunt’s recipe.”

Try a slice of each, for good measure.

CAKE TOO She certainly knows how the cake version came into being, since that was her idea. “I make a coconut cake that I learned from my neighbor more than 30 years ago,” Sara says. “One day in the kitchen, Jim was making his sweet potato pie mixture over where I couldn’t watch very closely, and I started to wonder what would happen if I added some of it to the yellow cake batter I use for coconut cake and then put some cream cheese icing on it. I tried it, and the results turned out to be very popular with our clientele.”

A festive mishmash of styles brightens Brick Street Café.

OTHER TREATS Besides sweet potato pie ($18.95/whole pie, $3.95/slice) and sweet potato cake ($37.95/large, $29.95/medium, $21.95/small, $4.25/slice), Brick Street Café also makes pineapple cake, 4-layer German chocolate cake, carrot cake, peanut butter cake, and more—all sold in-house by the slice and most available to go in several sizes. Also worth trying: blueberry pie and no-sugar-added apple pie. Although the bakery at Brick Street Café fits the “life is short, eat dessert first” school of thought, traditionalists might want to eat lunch or dinner before rewarding themselves. The eclectic menu ranges from fresh fruit plates, fried green tomatoes, and grilled salmon on mixed greens salad with roasted corn salsa, to roasted turkey hero or oyster po’ boy sandwiches, filet mignon with crab cake, sautéed shrimp and Andouille sausage on creamy grits, or vegetarian lasagna featuring spinach, zucchini, mushrooms, cheese, and marinara sauce. Hungry yet?

MUSIC NEXT DOOR The latest venture for Sara and Jim Wilson is Stella’s Music Emporium, located adjacent to their bustling restaurant and bakery. “Stella’s focuses on vintage stringed instruments, something that attracts the musician in me and the woodworker in Jim,” Sara says, still strumming her ukulele. “We hold live music happening, offer music lessons, stock vintage clothing and jewelry, and sell artwork that involves musical instruments in one way or another.”

WHERE Brick Street Café, 315 Augusta Street, Greenville, SC 29615

WHEN 11 a.m. – 2:30 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 5:30 – 9:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday

MORE INFO

• Brick Street Café at www.brickstreetcafe.com or 864-421-0111

• Stella’s Music Emporium at www.stellasme.com or 864-232-5221

• Greenville Visitors Center at www.greenvillecvb.com or 864-233-0461 (for more about the city)

• Discover Upcountry Carolina Association at www.theupcountry.com or 864-233-2690 or 800-849-4766 (for more about the northwest corner of South Carolina)

VG’s Bakery, Farragut, TN

 

Thumbprint Cookies. Photo by Andrew Hock.

Everything made from scratch and no compromising on quality are the twin mantras practiced at this excellent bakery west of Knoxville.

by Bakery Boy

“Fresh ingredients are the key to baking from scratch,” says David Gwin. Photo by Bakery Boy.

Just  when you think you know thumbprint cookies, along comes VG’s Bakery to change your whole perspective on the matter. “We make ours four inches in diameter and thicker than most, then load them with icing,” says co-owner David Gwin. “Nobody has a thumb that big, but we call them Thumbprints anyway.” They sell for $1.25 each or $12 for a baker’s dozen. Yes, even as giant as they are and with a discount for buying in volume, VG’s throws in an extra cookie to sweeten the deal. How nice is that?

 

REASONS TO LIKE That’s just one of many reasons to like this bakeshop in suburban Farragut, Tennessee, just west of Knoxville. Others include:

Scones

• Big, soft, moist Lemon Blueberry Scones or Apricot Pecan Scones

• Cream Cheese Sweet Rolls almost the size of a pie pans

• Pies bigger than pie pans because crusts and whipped cream overflow the rims on Key Lime, Chocolate Cream, and Coconut Cream versions

Chocolate Cake

• Layer cakes ranging from Red Velvet to Caramel, Carrot, egg-and-dairy-free Chocolate Fudge, and more

• A series of cookies on the scale of the impressive Thumbprints, including Lemon Iced, Double Chocolate, Oatmeal Raisin, Chewy Ginger, and Peanut Butter

Multigrain Bread

• Pan breads including great-for-toasting English Muffin, hot-on-the-tongue Cheddar Jalapeño Cornbread, and whole-wheat cracked-wheat Multigrain with lots of seeds

• Muffins that rise from baking tins and crack open like blooming flowers full of blueberries or cinnamon or (in those dubbed Morning Glories) with carrots, raisins, cranberry-raisins, walnuts, coconut, and pineapple

Macaroons

• Almond Macaroons, Coconut Macaroons, Chocolate Raspberry Oat Bars, and miscellaneous other goodies that fill showcases depending on the baking staff’s creative mood on any given day

• Because they’re always experimenting with new baked goods, each visit hold the promise of a few pleasant surprises

 

Katie Gwin (left) and her mother Vanessa Gwin. Photo by Bakery Boy.

THE V.G. IN VG’S Vanessa Gwin—a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, a former sous chef, the daughter of a baker, head baker at VG’s (named for her initials), and co-owner along with her Knoxville-native husband David—makes everything from scratch. “That’s something Vanessa insisted on from the beginning, that we’d take no shortcuts and never compromise on quality,” says David, a former consumer-electronics engineer and tool-and-dye salesman who helped her launch VG’s Bakery in 1999. “It all has to be fresh-made from the best ingredients we can find.”

 

Katie with more Thumbprints. Photo by Bakery Boy.

A FAMILY AFFAIR Daughter Katie Gwin has worked with her parents in the bakery since her early teenage years. Now she has a journalism degree from the University of Tennessee and is working toward another degree while still helping at the shop. Son Riley Gwin, a high school senior, is currently “a skateboarding fiend, so we don’t see much of him around the bakery,” David says with a laugh, adding, “but there’s hope!”

FARMERS MARKETS The Gwins set up shop at as many as eight farmers markets each week during the spring-to-fall growing season. “We take some of everything we bake to each one, except for desserts that would melt outside in the heat,” David says. “Cookies and sticky buns sell best because they look good and smell good and can be eaten right out of hand. People also buy a lot of bread to take home to eat along with the produce they get.”

Sticky Buns

David serves as secretary-treasurer of the East Tennessee Farmers Association for Retail Marketing (F.A.R.M.). “That might seem surprising, a baker leading a farm organization,” he says. “But when you think about it, we use a lot of flour, and flour is near the end of a food system that starts with those who plow fields and grow wheat. The same is true for most ingredients.” Markets they stock include:

Multigrain Loaves

• Knoxville Farmers Market, Laurel Church of Christ, Knoxville, Tuesdays & Fridays

• Market Square Farmers’ Market, Market Square, Knoxville, Wednesdays & Saturdays

• New Harvest Park Farmers Market, New Harvest Park, Knoxville, Thursdays

• Dixie Lee Farmers Market, Renaissance Shopping Plaza, Farragut, Saturdays

• Oak Ridge Farmers Market, Jackson Square, Oak Ridge, Saturdays

 

A salvaged jewelry case adds a special touch. Photo by Bakery Boy.

ABOUT THAT SHOWCASE One long wood-and-glass showcase adds an interesting element to VG’s Bakery. “It’s an awesome antique jewelry case we got for free from a coffeehouse we supplied baked good to that didn’t need it anymore,” David says. “We paid $100 to have it moved and then fixed it up to hold cookies and pastries. Makes a nice touch, don’t you think?”

ALL WORTHWHILE “We’ve been here just long enough that little kids who came in holding their mama’s hands are teenagers now and can drive here on their own,” David says. “They have fond memories of VG’s and get the same treats as always. It’s the kind of thing that makes all the hard work worthwhile.”

LOCATION VG’s Bakery, 11552 Kingston Pike, Farragut, TN 37934. Just west of Knoxville take I-40/75 Exit 373, go south on Campbell Station Road, then west on Kingston Pike to a shopping center on the left anchored by Kohl’s department store. VG’s is squeezed between an H&R Block tax preparation service and a Bahia Tans tanning salon.

HOURS Monday-Friday 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Saturday 8 a.m.-3 p.m.

INFO www.vgsbakery.com or 865-671-8077

[Special thanks to photographer Andrew Hock of www.visualdelicious.com for his close-up images of baked goods.]

Australian Bakery Cafe, Marietta, GA

Down Under bakers put the “g’day mate” and “good on ya” into an unrivaled bakery experience, especially if you like meat pies.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Australian bakers Mark Allen (left) & Neville Steel. Photos by Bakery Boy.

You wouldn’t think to go to Georgia to hear Australian slang. Southern slang, yes, though not from quite that far south. Well, say g’day mate (hello, friend) to the fair dinkum (genuine) Aussies (Australians) making dinky di (honest to goodness) Down Under specialties at the Australian Bakery Café in Marietta. You’ll hear those phrases and more while having a cultural experience at this bakeshop northwest of Atlanta. When you leave with a belly full of meat pies and a box full of more for later, you’ll be saying good on ya (thanks) and righteo (yes).

The bakery faces Marietta Square.

“This might be the only Australian bakery in the United States and for sure the oldest,” says Mark Allen, co-owner along with Neville Steel of the bakeshop they’ve run since 2001 facing downtown’s Marietta Square. They make a variety of sweet Australian goodies—such as crunchy oatmeal cookies they call Anzac Biscuits, walnut-laced chocolate desserts known as Hedgehog Slices, and pillow-y discs of meringue topped with strawberries and whipped cream—but they are best known for meat pies.

Neville: “We make thousands of four-inch meat pies every week.”

MEAT PIES? “Righteo, meat pies, that’s what it’s all about here, mate,” Neville says while rolling out enough pie-crust pastry dough to go under and over more than 200 of the 4-inch-square pies he’s making during an interview for the Bakery Boy Blog. “Meat pies are an Australian tradition we introduced here.”

Picture a flaky, oven-browned square the length of a deck of cards and twice as thick as one. It fits in hand like a sandwich, but keep it over a plate to catch the delicious sauce that oozes out after you bite in. Australian Bakery Cafe makes more than two dozen varieties.

Murals , meat pies, accents—the atmosphere is 100% Australian.

The original meat pie involves chopped beef sirloin in seasoned gravy. Options include steak and cheese, steak and onions, steak and mushrooms, steak and kidney, steak and peppers, chicken and vegetables, curry chicken, curry lamb, spinach and feta, shepherds pie, and others. There’s a Ned Kelly Pie named for an historical Aussie figure, a mid-1800s bushranger seen by some as a violent outlaw and by others as a Robin Hood-style folk hero for his defiance of colonial authority. “The Ned Kelly is a outback tough man’s pie stuffed with eggs, cheese, and ham,” Neville says, “with an egg on top too.”

Down Under flags hang overhead.

With so many choices, Neville and Mark created a Pie Identification Chart to remember which is which. For example the basic Australian meat pie has a single hole on top, steak and kidney pie is sprinkled with black poppy seeds, buffalo-chicken pie has paprika and four holes. “Without that chart we’d just be guessing what’s inside and so would our employees,” Neville says. “Of course we’d enjoy them anyway, because they’re all good.” They make a separate line of sausage rolls, meat-filled pasties, and pork pies, which are easier to ID because they’re different shapes.

Flaky crust and tasty gravy make a just-right meat pie.

WHAT’S THE SECRET? The crust can make or break a good meat pie. That goes double for what’s inside. “It’s no secret, really. The trick is to have a good, flaky, buttery pastry (what you Americans call crust) and a thick, tasty gravy,” Neville says. “We perfected the pastry long ago, so now we focus on getting the best possible meats, veggies, spices, and other ingredients.”

FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES Besides local customers, regulars include the Australian Embassy and the Australian Ambassador’s Residence in Washington D.C. “They order hundreds of meat pies when they want to impress visitors with some genuine Australian food,” Mark says. “We also supply a lot of famous Aussies living in America. Keith Urban the country singer, Mel Gibson the actor, Olivia Newton-John the singer and actress, Stuart Appleby and Wendy Doolan the professional golfers, Graham Russell of the rock band Air Supply, and others have placed orders. We ship frozen pies overnight anywhere in the country, and all people have to do is warm them and serve. For Australians, what we’re really delivering is a little taste of home.”

“I love experimenting with new pies,” Neville says, fitting pastry dough over hundreds in a batch.

CHILDHOOD FRIENDS Neville and Mark, now 50, have known each other since preschool. “We’re both from bakery families in the city of Boort, about 250 miles northwest of Melbourne,” Neville says. “We went our separate ways and then met up again while attending the bakery school at William Angliss Institute in Melbourne. We each worked in several bakeries in Australia. Mark moved to the States in 1991, I followed in 1999, and we opened our Marietta bakery in 2001.

LOVING IT “I love baking every day and experimenting with new meat pies,” Neville says. “Today I’m messing around with barbecued pork and different spices for the gravy just to see what I get. The good ones go on the menu. The not-so-good ones we eat anyway but don’t make again.”

Bluegrass instruments come out for Tuesday night jams at the bakery.

BLUEGRASS IN THE BAKERY This is not an Australian tradition, if you were wondering. Mark explains: “My ex-wife Wendy, who is our business partner, has a new husband, Greg, who plays bluegrass banjo. He started hanging out here with his music friends, and the crowd of people playing and listening kept growing. So every Tuesday we hold an Open Bluegrass Jam. Anyone can bring an instrument and join in, whether they’re already seasoned players or just beginning to learn. We keep the bakery open until 9 o’clock to feed them meat pies when they get hungry from all that pickin’.” For more information about the Bluegrass Jam visit http://aussiejam.wordpress.com

Australian stuffed animals for sale in the shop window include kangaroos, koalas, kookaburras, and wombats.

LOCATION Australian Bakery Café, 48 South Park Square, Marietta, GA 30060. A second store is in East Atlanta Village at 463 Flat Shoals Avenue, Atlanta, GA 30316

HOURS Mon-Fri 7 a.m.-5:30 p.m. (Tue ‘til 9 p.m. for Open Bluegrass Jam); Sat-Sun 8 a.m.-4 p.m.

INFO www.australianbakery.com or 678-797-6222

Breadgarden, Atlanta, GA

Atlanta’s guru of good bread waxes eloquent about the taste and texture of truly worthy loaves.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Breadgarden produces a variety of crusty, slow-rising, tasty, aromatic breads. Photos by Bakery Boy.

When Catherine Krasnow starts talking about her favorite subject—baking bread—listen closely because you’re in for a treat. Founder and owner of Breadgarden, an artisan bakery tucked in the Virginia Highland area of Atlanta, she’s both an excellent baker and, on this topic at least, a bit of a poet.

“A proper sourdough starter and a long rise time, that’s how you bring out the best flavor in bread,” Catherine says. “Like good wine, you get the full flavor only when you take your time and do things right, though with bread it’s a matter of hours instead of days or weeks or even years.”

With that analogy, spoken as we sat at one of just two tables in the shop’s small retail area, she’s off and running.

Perfect baguettes include a careful balance of crustiness on the outside and softness on the inside.

“So much of what makes a good loaf of bread is about texture,” Catherine says. “Take a good French baguette: The crusty outside, the soft inside. The immediate flavor of the first bite, the ‘front taste’ you get right away, then the subtle ‘back taste’ that comes later. The slight sweetness of the caramelized crust and the chewy character of the soft inside, that’s what bakers look for.”

“You get all this marvelous complexity from just four basic ingredients: flour, salt, water, and yeast,” she concludes, smiling. “Isn’t it amazing?”

Yes it is. A loyal clientele claims retail loaves before they’re sold out each day, but far more of the bread goes to wholesale accounts. Breadgarden supplies such noteworthy Atlanta-area eateries as Café Lily and Watershed Restaurant in Decatur, Wisteria Restaurant in Inman Park, The Mansion on Peachtree (a boutique hotel) in Buckhead, plus other fine bistros and coffeehouses.

Bread shelves empty quickly due to popular demand.

BREAD LINEUP Here are some of the crusty, aromatic, and highly worthwhile European-style breads at Breadgarden, most loaves priced in the $4 range. Grab them early in the day because the supply tends to run out before closing time:  Ciabatta… Country Italian… Duram Semolina… Tuscan… Integrale (mixed grain)… Sourdough… Sourdough Whole Wheat… Sourdough Rye… Sourdough Raisin Nut Rye… Pumpernickel… Baguettes… Walnut… Onion… Spinach Garlic… Sun-dried Tomato & Herb… Rosemary… Calamata Olive… Onion & Cheese Focaccia… Challah…

It's all about good bread.

NON-BREAD A few non-bread items inhabit a small showcase. On a good day there are croissants, fruit Danish, currant scones, butter-cream-iced cupcakes, brownies, biscotti, muffins, chocolate torte, and a ham-and-three-cheeses quiche. Around mid-day you can order an Italian sub or Mediterranean vegetables-and-goat-cheese sandwich, emphasis on the bread they’re wrapped in. Sometimes a focaccia loaded with tomato, onion, feta, and herbs will make it partway through lunch hour. But these are afterthoughts. Breadgarden is primarily about bread.

CATHERINE’S STORY She doesn’t like to be in photos but did share some background. “I moved here from the Bay Area of California in 1990 and didn’t find a lot going on in the way of good artisan-style bread,” she says. “I saw an opportunity and started Breadgarden. I’m a self-taught baker—learned by reading books, experimenting at home, and visiting bakeries. My education and my previous career were in botany and bio-chemicals, which actually helped when I was learning the science behind baking, although I soon realized it’s as much an art form. My bread-making philosophy? It’s all about flavor, texture, and freshness. I bake at night so the bread is fresh every morning when people start wanting it.”

A basket of baguettes on the door welcomes Breadgarden guests.

HIDDEN TREASURE Breadgarden isn’t exactly easy to find in the little Amsterdam Walk business district on the eastern edge of Atlanta’s sprawling Piedmont Park. Loyal customers originally find it by word of mouth. There’s no  website. It’s not a hangout kind of shop. The utilitarian retail area encourages you to get in, choose some bread, pay up (cash only!) and go on your way.

DECIDE FOR YOURSELF I was shocked and a little amused to find online reviews citing Breadgarden for rudeness and, as one critic put it, “getting a slice of crazy with your ciabatta.” Maybe it’s a matter of expectations. I visited many times anonymously before introducing myself as the guy from the Bakery Boy Blog, asking to interview the owner, and sharing an hour of interesting bakery talk with her. The place is clearly focused on making good bread, not on creating a stay-awhile coffeehouse atmosphere, and I’m okay with that. I’d return even if the service hit a Seinfeldian “Soup Nazi” level, because the bread is worth it. Perhaps the resident breadophiles are a tad eccentric about their chosen field, but go decide for yourself—and let the bread do the talking.

LOCATION Breadgarden, 549-5 Amsterdam Avenue NE, Atlanta, GA 30306; from northbound I-75/I-85 in downtown Atlanta take Exit 248-C, go east on 10^th Street past Piedmont Park, turn left on Monroe Drive, at the second traffic light turn left on Amsterdam Avenue, which ends at Amsterdam Walk with Breadgarden on the left.

HOURS Mon-Wed 9 a.m.-4 p.m., Thu-Fri 9 a.m.-6 p.m.

INFO Breadgarden has no website. It gets plenty of business through word-of-mouth and press coverage, including this Bakery Boy Blog mention, so why bother being online? Call 404-875-1166.

Cake Croutons—What a Concept

An idea so crazy it just might work. The Sweetery in South Carolina makes Cake Croutons in five flavors.

by Bakery Boy

Cake Croutons from The Sweetery. Photos by Bakery Boy.

Who needs dried cubes of bread when you can have dried cubes of CAKE instead? And these Cake Croutons aren’t just for topping salads anymore.

“What we do,” says Ryan Jarahian, head baker at The Sweetery in Anderson, South Carolina, “is start with basic pound cakes, cut them into cubes, spread those out on baking sheets, and bake them again for 4 to 5 hours at a low temperature like 200 degrees. They get good and dry, just like bread croutons, only they’re cake. Everyone likes cake.”

Cake Croutons add a sweet crunch to salads, soups, ice cream, dips, pie crusts, grilled meats, and more.

Cake Croutons in regular production are Original, Chocolate, Butter Pecan, Cinnamon Espresso, and Southwestern, the latter dusted with hot chili powder. Except for the spicy southwestern version, each adds a sweet crunch in places you might not expect to find a sweet crunch.

"Inventing new treats such as or Cake Croutons makes this job fun," says baker Ryan Jarahian of The Sweetery.

“You can sprinkle Cake Croutons on green salads, just like other croutons, and create a whole different experience,” Ryan says. “Chocolate Cake Croutons go well on spinach salad or ice cream. Crumble the Butter Pecan Cake Croutons to use in pie dough. Drop Southwestern Cake Croutons into soup or crumble them to use as a rub for grilled meats.”

“Just like bread croutons, only they’re

cake. Everyone likes cake.” – Ryan Jarahian

 

Photo by Linda Askey of http://www.lindaaskey.com.

WHOSE IDEA? “We enjoy creating new desserts around here all the time, but we can’t take full credit for Cake Croutons,” says Ryan, whose mother Jane founder The Sweetery 25 years ago (click here to see separate story). “An intern from Clemson University was working here and overheard us talking about new product ideas for a trade show we were going to. We were looking for something that might go over well with a younger audience. She took a few cakes with her to a culinary class, the students brainstormed, and what they came up with was the idea of croutons made of cake. We took it from there and ran with it.”

WINE STICKS TOO Before long, Ryan and Jane had modified the basic Cake Crouton idea into a second line called Wine Sticks. “They’re the same as the croutons except they’re cut long and thin like biscotti,” Ryan says. “You can use them like crackers with dips or spreads, or you can put cheese on them. The Chocolate Wine Sticks go well with red wine.”

 

And then there were...fewer: These Butter Pecan, Chocolate, and Southwestern Cake Croutons were all that remained near the end of my photo shoot.

A BAKERY BOY CONFESSION I brought home three kinds of Cake Croutons—Chocolate, Butter Pecan, and Southwestern—and the challenge was to NOT eat them before photographing them. Quite a few didn’t make it through the photo shoot. There are too many to fit in the frame anyway, I reasoned, so I culled out (yum) any slightly imperfect ones. Then I culled out (gulp) a few perfectly perfect ones. Then I decided to go with a smaller grouping (crunch). Then I zoomed in on what remained (mmm). When I finally got the shot I wanted, the rest disappeared in seconds (ahh). I guess it better be the shot I want, because it’s too late now!

TO ORDER Go online to www.thesweetery.com to explore the wide variety of cakes, pies, cookies, and more that The Sweetery makes, then call 864-224-8394 or toll free 800-752-1188 to place an order. The base price of a 8-ounce package of Cake Croutons is $4.25. Tell them the Bakery Boy Blog sent you.

Stick Boy Bread Co., Boone, NC

For its impressive baked goods, Stick Boy belongs on any bakery fan’s must-try list, even if the name begs explanation.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Thin bakery owner Carson Coatney often gets mistaken for Stick Boy.

Stick Boy breads include crusty, aromatic loaves, often with inventive ingredients. Photos by Bakery Boy.

With the name Stick Boy Bread Co., I half expected its owner to be skinny. Or maybe, I thought, the menu will involve baguettes (bread “sticks”) and not much else. It turns out Carson Coatney is indeed a thin man and yes he makes some lovely baguettes, but that’s not where the name comes from and certainly not the only thing he makes. A few minutes into my first visit to the Boone, North Carolina, establishment it quickly became one of my favorite bakeries ever, both for the variety offered and the energetic attitude.

“It happens all the time, people thinking Stick Boy refers to me,” says Carson, co-owner with his wife, Mindy. “I hope the real story doesn’t disappoint you.” In short, as they prepared to open in 2001, a friend in Virginia spotted an apparent joke of a sign stuck to a utility pole and sporting the words “Lost—Stick Boy,” plus a hand-drawn stick figure and a fake phone number. She laughed, told them about it, and suggested it as a bakery name. Initially they scoffed, but the idea grew on them.

Spinach Feta French Bread

Mindy’s artistic aunt, Suzie Sadak, designed a logo showing a chef’s-hat-wearing stick boy running with a loaf of bread, and soon the couple’s bakery was off and running too.

A local woodworker crafts baker's peels like this, for sale at Stick Boy.

SO MANY CHOICES Keep your head on a swivel at Stick Boy, because options abound. A wall of shelves holds hefty, aromatic, artisan loaves—crusty outside, softer but firmly textured inside—ranging from Spinach Feta and Roasted Red Pepper Sourdough to Italian Ciabatta, Honey Wheat, Organic Whole Wheat Multigrain, Organic Spelt with Raisins, Cranberry Pecan French, Rustic Apple, Pumpkin, Fig Walnut Wheat, Kalamata Olive, Blueberry Oatmeal, and others. Showcases teem with fruit pies, carrot cakes, chocolate tortes, scones, cookies, and amazing sticky buns loaded with cinnamon, raisins, and walnuts. A hot espresso bar and a cool smoothie station diversify the offerings. There are also beautifully handcrafted cutting boards and baker’s peels (those flat shovel-like tools used to move hot goodies around) made from fallen trees in the Blue Ridge Mountains at a nearby woodwork studio called Elkland Handwerke (see more at Fall Creek Woods).

Summer Stollen

SUMMER STOLLEN During the holidays a popular item is a dense Christmas Stollen laced with golden raisins, candied orange peal, cranberries, and almonds. “Instead of waiting all year, we created something similar that works in summer,” Carson says. “The Summer Stollen has blueberries, cranberries, pineapple, candied lemon peel, pecans, and a glaze of blueberry icing.”

"Blueberries and cherries for our pies come from from nearby orchards," Carson says.

LOVE THOSE BLUEBERRIES “In summer we bake a lot of blueberries into pies, scones, bread, and pastries,” Carson says. “There’s a blueberry farm nearby called Old Orchard Creek, and the owner brings me fresh-picked fruit all through July and August. We go through half a dozen 6-quart buckets every week. We like to use local, organic, and fresh ingredients whenever possible.”

HUMBLE BEGINNINGS Carson grew up in western Kentucky, studied economics and chemistry at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, and frequented Boone, where he met and married Mindy, a Boone native. “We had the idea to start a bakery before we knew anything about baking,” Carson says.

Pie time at Stick Boy.

“I’d recently graduated when we happened into the Great Harvest Bread Co. in Alexandria, Virginia. We liked what we saw: terrific artisan breads, all kinds of fresh-baked goods, a lot of organic and local ingredients, and bakers who seemed happy with their work. We thought, Boone needs something like this, and we could be those happy bakers.”

Current and former Appalachian State University students make up much of the Stick Boy staff.

Carson completed a one-week bread-making class at a Minnesota baking school and experimented at home until he felt he had enough successes and enough variety to start Stick Boy. “We rented a tiny place, a thousand square feet, just enough room for an oven, a mixer, and a table,” he says. “There was hardly room for customers. We gradually added more bread to the lineup, then scones and cookies and pies. When the laundry next door closed, we tripled our space, rounded up more equipment, worktables, and showcases, and things really took off.”

They hired a friend, then a relative, and then a succession of enthusiastic students from Appalachian State University located across the street. Mindy is at home more now that they have three sons (ages 8, 6, and 4), but remains integral to the operation.

SERIAL ENTREPRENEURS “I think I’m genetically wired to be an entrepreneur,” Carson says. “I had an uncle in Kentucky who was always launching some sideline that I’d help with. At Duke I started a laundry service for students.” Following Stick Boy’s success, the Coatneys partnered with a former employee (Katie Dies and her husband Josh) to open a second Stick Boy Bread Co. in Fuquay-Varina, about 200 miles east on the outskirts of Raleigh. Along with another trusted employee they recently bought the Boone restaurant Melanie’s Food Fantasy from a bread customer who was ready to retire. “As serial entrepreneurs,” the ambitious Carson says, “we always look for opportunities.”

LOCATION Stick Boy Bread Co., 345 Hardin Street, Boone, NC 28607 (across U.S. 321 from ASU)

HOURS 7 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Mon-Fri, 7 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Sat

INFO www.stickboybread.com or 828-268-9900

AREA INFO Boone Visitors Center, Boone Chamber of Commerce, Visit North Carolina

Winkler Bakery, Winston-Salem, NC

A wood-fired brick oven, hand-mixed dough, and a pioneer spirit mark this historic bakeshop in Old Salem, little changed since 1800.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Winkler Bakery faces a quiet brick lane in preserved village of Old Salem.

If you want to see how bread was made before modern machinery and taste the all-natural results, go to Winkler Bakery in Old Salem. You’ll find a wood-fired beehive-shaped brick oven and dough mixed in manger-like troughs by bakers gripping long wooden paddles. These period-costumed artisans are as much interpreters as bakers, patiently explaining each step in the process to curious visitors.

Baker Bobby James with honey-wheat loaves fresh from the wood-fired oven. Photos by Bakery Boy.

Every step in the slow-paced process is done by hand.

Established in 1800 by Moravian families from Eastern Europe who settled in what is now Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the bakery uses methods unchanged for centuries. Bakers stack split white oak firewood into little log-cabin-like ricks, shove them into a 9-feet-deep, 7-feet-wide, 10-feet-high oven with a flat floor and a domed ceiling, and light them early in the morning. As fire heats the oven to 600 degrees, the bakers mix dough, weigh, knead, and shape loaves at a sturdy wooden table, and set them near the oven’s warmth to rise.

Split white oak fuels this old-fashioned operation.

They also make sugar cakes and cutout cookies, timing each batch to bake as the oven, swept clear of embers and ashes, slowly cools to just the right temperatures: 450 degrees for bread, lower for cakes, and lowest for cookies. The workday isn’t complete until bakers haul more firewood from a nearby shed and arrange it for the next day’s production.

Glowing embers heat the bricks.

“This is the way bakers have done things here for more than 200 years,” says baker Bobby James. “People can step in, watch us work, and ask questions. They’re always interested in how things happened before everything became so mechanized. It’s really a very simple process.”

Baker Jeffrey Sherrill shoves bread into the radiant oven.

One thing is different. “We use a thermometer now to determine oven temperature,” says baker Jeffrey Sherrill. “In the old days bakers knew from experience. They would toss in a pinch of flour and count how many seconds it took (24 was good) to turn a golden brown.”

ABOUT THE NAME The first bakers to work here weren’t named Winkler. Christian Winkler arrived a few years later in 1807 and baked for 30 years. His descendants ran the bakery until 1926, plenty of time to make the name stick.

WHAT THEY MAKE Winkler Bakery makes three main products daily, all for sale in the next room from women wearing long cotton dresses and neat white aprons and bonnets or from men in suspender-held trousers reminiscent of the early 1800s.

• 

  Peek into the cave-like chamber to see bread baking. As many as 90 loaves can fit inside at once.

  Bread: They start with the basics—water, flour, butter, eggs, sugar, and yeast—then for variety add honey, rosemary, garlic, and other ingredients to some batches.

• Moravian Sugar Cake: A dense, gooey coffeecake similar to what some call honey buns or monkey bread, it’s rich with brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon.
• Cookies: Thin cutouts, often laced with ginger, come in the shapes of flowers, stars, leaves, crescent moons, Thanksgiving turkeys, Christmas trees, and more.

In the shop you’ll also find oatmeal raisin cookies, cinnamon raisin bars, banana nut bread, and other treats made at a newer facility nearby. There’s an entire line of construction-paper-thin cookies too, packed in tubes or tins, that feature ginger, lemon, cranberry-orange, apple, maple, chocolate, and other flavors.

Tools of the trade.

MAIL ORDER Can’t get to Winston-Salem soon? Some baked goods, especially a variety of thin spice cookies, as well as Old Salem beeswax candles and other items, are available by mail. Click here to see the mail-order menu.

IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD Winkler Bakery sits at the heart of Old Salem Museums & Gardens, a lively historic village that recalls the community’s formative years in the late 1700s and early 1800s. It includes 100 acres of restored landscapes, heirloom gardens, 80 preserved buildings, a tavern, a gunsmith shop, and the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts.

Old Salem staffers look the part. Photos by Bakery Boy.

Also in the historic village stands Salem College, the all-female liberal arts institution founded in 1772 that pioneered equal education for women in this country. Just seeing so many young people (the student population is about 1,100) moving around Salem’s brick streets and grassy paths lends a surprising exuberance to a setting known for showcasing antiquated farming, baking, building, and blacksmithing skills. Their presence reflects the original Moravian settlers’ philosophy, which held schooling in high regard.

LOCATION Winkler Bakery, 525 South Main Street, Winston-Salem, NC 27101

HOURS 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon-Sat, 1-5 p.m. Sun

INFO www.oldsalem.org, 336-721-7302 (Winkler Bakery), 336-721-7300 (Old Salem); for more about area attractions contact Winston-Salem Visitor Center and Visit North Carolina.

Old Mill Square, Pigeon Forge, TN

Stone-ground grains for the baked goods served at two restaurants here come from an historic gristmill right next door.

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Head Baker Jay Connatser sets hot sourdough, honey-wheat, and multi-grain loaves to cool. Photos by Bakery Boy

Talk about fresh ingredients! Much of the grains used in the bakery and kitchens for two restaurants at Old Mill Square in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, come from an 1830 gristmill still in use a stone’s throw away. Not that anyone would throw one of the massive 2,000-pound granite millstones that reduce whole wheat and corn to flour, cornmeal, and grits—stones turned by a giant waterwheel rigged to harness the Little Pigeon River.

Head baker Jay Connatser and his crew work in a corner of the Old Mill Pottery House Café & Grille, a corner that just happens to include floor-to-ceiling windows with a view of the nearby mill. “We get fresh flour delivered regularly from where it was milled just a couple of hundred feet away,” Jay says as he pulls large and aromatic loaves from the oven. “As an artisan baker, I like the sound of that, and our customers seem to appreciate it too.”

The Little Pigeon River turns a giant waterwheel at The Old Mill, built in 1830 and still grinding corn and wheat today.

At the Pottery House Café and the adjacent Old Mill Restaurant, a pair of country-style family places popular with visitors to the nearby Great Smoky Mountains, the biscuits, corn bread, pancakes, hush puppies, muffins, grits, and breads all include fresh-milled grains. The bakery also produces terrific pies (coconut cream, chocolate pecan, lemon meringue, peanut butter), rich layer cakes (carrot, chocolate), daily quiches (one with meat, one all vegetables), as well as brownies, cookies, and other goodies.

“Besides supplying the two restaurants and a retail counter so people can take our baked goods home, we also get to experiment,” Jay says enthusiastically. “I came up with the olive bread used for the pimiento sandwiches. Fellow bakers designed the focaccia, onion-rye, cranberry-walnut, and some of the other loaves we make.”

Simple mechanisms that are amazing to watch reduce grains to flour and meal.

TOUR THE MILL Whether you go before or after eating at one of the restaurants or just check it out while passing through, it’s worthwhile to tour The Old Mill & General Store. You’ll see antique equipment—an ingenious system of shafts, belts, millstones, pulleys, grain elevators, chutes, and sifters—still in working order. For 180 years millers have filled, weighed, and tied each sack by hand, stacking bags of yellow and white grits, cornmeal, a variety of flours, and pancake mix. These travel a few feet to the store, a few yards to sibling restaurants, or thousands of miles to anywhere by post. Tours start in the mill store; call 865-453-4628 for details.

If you like the plate your carrot cake comes on, buy one next door at Pigeon River Pottery.

LIKE ’EM? BUY ’EM! The beautifully turned, glazed, and fired plates, bowls, salt-and-pepper shakers, and other serving pieces at Old Mill Square’s restaurants—and even the bathroom sinks—are handcrafted at adjacent Old Mill Pigeon River Pottery. Buy some to take some home if you like.

IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD Pigeon Forge is clearly a tourists’ town geared toward entertaining visitors who come to be near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (just south of town) but who don’t particularly care to spend much time outdoors. Attractions include…

• 

  Smoky Mountains photo courtesy of Pigeon Forge Department of Tourism

  Dollywood amusement park

• Dixie Stampede dinner rodeo
• Elvis Museum tributes to the King
• WonderWorks scientific marvels
• Belz Outlets factory discount shops
• 

  Dixie Stampede photo courtesy of Pigeon Forge Department of Tourism

  Live-performance theaters more than a dozen featuring music, comedy, inspiration, mystery, and magic shows

• Titanic a detailed partial re-creation of the doomed ocean-liner

These represent just the tip of the iceberg (chilling Titanic reference intended). For a complete rundown of what’s available check with the Pigeon Forge Department of Tourism at www.mypigeonforge.com or 1-800-251-9100.

Tall stacks of freshly milled flour await buyers.

Vintage rubber stamps are used to mark flour sacks.

LOCATION Old Mill Square, 175 Old Mill Avenue, Pigeon Forge, TN 37868; 30 miles southeast of Knoxville. From U.S. 441, the main north-south route in town, turn east at Traffic Light #7 (they’re numbered for direction-giving convenience) and go three short blocks.

HOURS The Old Mill Restaurant is open 7:30 a.m.-9 p.m. daily; 865-429-3463. The Old Mill Pottery House Café & Grille serves lunch 11 a.m.-4 p.m. daily, dinner 4-8 p.m. Sun-Thu and 4-9 p.m. Fri-Sat; 865-453-6002.

INFO www.oldmillsquare.com or 865-428-0771

Henri’s Bakery, Atlanta, GA

Pronounce it the French way, on-REE, and then try a taste of just about anything and say Oo-la-la!

story & photos by Bakery Boy

Henri’s iconic ’60s-vintage sign rises from Atlanta’s Buckhead Village. Photos by Bakery Boy.

Henri’s Bakery has made Atlanta bakery fans happy for more than 80 years, even if many still don’t get the French pronunciation right. “Some people say HEN-ree and we just let it slide,” a saleswoman told me as I bit into an enormous chocolate éclair filled with Bavarian crème. “Those who know us best and have been coming here forever get it right and say on-REE.”

It’s a moot point when your mouth is too full of goodies to talk, which is often the case at Henri’s, a mainstay at the Buckhead Village shopping and dining district in Atlanta. Founded in 1929 by Henri Fiscus, who emigrated from France’s Alsace-Lorraine region, it is now run primarily by granddaughter Madeline Leonard and co-owned by five siblings including Madeline, her sisters Suzette, Michelle, and Mimi, and their brother Ray.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT TURNED BAKER I’ve met many bakers, but never one whose path to baking matches Madeline Leonard’s. “I was a young woman working as a flight attendant when my grandfather died in 1974 at the age of 80,” she says. “I didn’t work at the bakery much growing up, but I was very close to my grandfather. It was a shock to learn that he had left the entire place to me. I basically inherited Henri’s.”

At first she wasn’t sure what to do, so she kept her airline job. “I signed up to work all-night turnaround flights, and I’d go straight from the airport to the bakery at 5 a.m. and learn all I could about the whole operation. Henri had trained his staff so well they could run it without him, but that couldn’t go on forever. I realized if I didn’t keep Henri’s going, the bank would take possession and sell it. So I studied all the formulas [bakers prefer the word formulas to recipes] and the baking techniques and the business side. Two employees who worked for Henri and taught me a lot—brothers Donalson and Willie James—are still here. In the beginning I was afraid I’d mess things up, but as I gained confidence I learned to love it.” Soon she  quit moonlighting as a flight attendant and devoted her full attention to Henri’s.

Gingerbread

KNOWN FOR It’d be easier to list what Henri’s is not known for, but here’s a short version of the good stuff.

• Dozens of kinds of cookies overflow showcases, including standouts such as thumbprint-style shortbread cookies, raisin-buttoned gingerbread men, coconut macaroons, large-scale chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies, and (my favorite) dainty little Daisy cookies with raspberry jam atop daisy-shaped cutouts.

• 

  Daisy Cookies

  Traditional wedding cakes, all sizes of birthday cakes, and cakes varying from black forest to carrot, caramel, marble cheesecake, and strawberry shortcake lead a long litany.

• Breads range from French baguettes to braided challah, dark pumpernickel, whole wheat, German rye, butter-crust, cinnamon logs, sourdough, spinach-and-garlic bread, multiple colors of rectangular Pullman loaves, poppy-seeded knot rolls, and more.
• 

  Eclairs

  Pastries run the gamut from layered napoleons and colorful petit fours to tiramisu tarts, baklava, cream horns, chocolate pralines, crème cheese brownies, almond-filled croissants, apricot squares, and tuxedo-style chocolate-dipped strawberries.

• The pie case holds pecan, mincemeat, coconut crème, key lime, egg custard, chess pies (vanilla, lemon, German chocolate), fruit pies  (apple, cherry, blueberry, peach), and more.

Po’ boys

EXPANDED ROLE Over time Henri’s has diversified to include a full-scale deli and sandwich shop famous for thickly stacked Po’ boys on French baguettes picnic-ready egg salad and tuna salad, party-ready fruit, veggie, meat, and cheese trays, and a variety of quiches and pot pies. There’s also an espresso bar and indoor and outdoor seating for the lunch-and-linger crowd.

THEY DO IT ALL While the trend in bakeries leans toward more specialized niches (notice the cupcakes-only places springing up lately) Henri’s manages to excel in just about every aspect of baking. It’s a disappearing genre—and a marvel of carefully orchestrated production—that deserves our applause and support.

WATCH THEM WORK Personally I like it when a bakery lets you see what’s going on in the back room. First, it’s quite a show when all the bakers are working at once, creating amazing goodies. Second, it’s bound to be a cleaner operation if employees know the customers are watching every move. At Henri’s a broad picture window behind the display cases allows views of an array of ovens, mixers, workbenches, and busy bakers. A separate window reveals the cake decorating area, where observant visitors might pick up pointers to improve their own cake-frosting skills.

MORE ABOUT HENRI A faded photo (shown here) of founder and namesake Henri hangs in the bakery office. “My grandfather, who came to America from France in 1921, was a true master of the bakery arts,” Madeline says. “He worked as a chef on ocean-liners and at fine restaurants in New York and Atlanta, including a stint as head chef at the Biltmore Hotel in its heyday on West Peachtree Street not far from here. He worked in a Midtown bakery, bought it, renamed it Henri’s, and moved it four times before settling in 1967 where we are now in Buckhead. He’s still an inspiration. Not a day goes by when I don’t think about him. I love carrying on the baking tradition he started.”

LOCATION 61 Irby Avenue NW, Atlanta, GA 30305 (north of downtown in the Buckhead Village area surrounding the intersection of Peachtree Road NE, West Paces Ferry Road NW, and Roswell Road NE).

SECOND STORE 6289 Roswell Road, Sandy Springs, GA 30328 (north of Atlanta about a mile north of Exit 25 on the I-285 perimeter highway)

HOURS Mon-Sat 7 a.m.-6 p.m.

INFO www.henrisbakery.com, 404-237-0202 (Buckhead), 404-256-7934 (Sandy Springs)