It’s 6:30 a.m. and I am calling Bendtsen’s Bakery to try to catch the baker. But I fail. Again.
“He’s making kringles,” says the woman on the phone, apologetically. “This is a busy time right now. We’re making thousands a day.”
The week before, I’d been told the baker and his lone assistant had come in just after midnight. This week, it was closer to 10 p.m. and staying well into mid-morning before heading home to rest. Such is the reality of creating Wisconsin’s official state pastry.
Bendt Bendtsen, Sr. (second generation) (left) and Bendt Bendtsen Jr. (third generation) at work together making kringle dough in Bendtsen’s Bakery, Racine, Wis., in 1980. (Courtesy of Bendtsen’s Bakery)
The Kringle Capital
Wisconsinites associate Racine, a city south of Milwaukee along Lake Michigan, with kringles. This magnificent, sharable, Danish-style pastry contains up to 36 flaky layers and a variety of fillings—traditionally almonds or raisins, but now a wider range of fruits, nuts, cream cheese, and more. Four famous bakeries with seven total locations produce them here in the Kringle Capital of America, and most residents are happy to share an opinion about which is best….