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Best of the Bakeries
Braided Czech Delight
Family Ties
Before the sun comes up over north-central Kansas, early risers in the small town of Clay Center slip into the Tasty Pastry Bakery for their daily quota of fried cinnamon-nut rolls. Almost as big as saucers, these frosted creations topped with peanuts set mouths watering at the little white shop with its jaunty blue-and-white awnings. "The bakery is a gathering place in our farming community," reader Jo Close told us.
The Tasty Pastry is just one of the baker's dozen establishments that stood out among the hundreds you recommended when we asked you to nominate the best hometown bakeries in the Midwest. In glowing two- and three-page testimonials, you described gooey doughnuts, crusty breads and tender coffee cakes, right down to the last pecan. See the full list:
Family ties run deep at several Heartland establishments we visited. "It's kind of like being born into farming," says third-generation baker Ron Heyerley, who operates Heyerley's in Ossian, Indiana, with brothers Stan, Galen and Lynn, and his sister, Anita Davis. Irresistible aromas have lured customers off the highway to this northeast Indiana bakery since 1931.
