West End Bakery - Mishawaka, IN

West End Bakery - Mishawaka, IN

 Cute little West End Bakery

Technically, this one is just a hair outside of our Chicagoland border for this blog, which is why I am not including a map, but the kids and I recently spent a week with friends in a rental house in the town of Mishawaka, Indiana. Mishawaka is about 20 minutes away from Notre Dame University, and offers absolutely zero lakes to swim in within a one hour radius, which was a little disappointing for our annual lake house trip, but I digress.  It also has a quaint little downtown that time seems to have forgotten, and that is where we happened upon West End Bakery, which is appropriately the bakery that time seems to have forgotten.

West End Bakery was tiny, and a bit run down, which made me question it at first. I brought only L with me and she was in her pajamas, and I was sporting a look that we shall call "on vacation" and we definitely were getting the side eye as we parked and walked past the up an at em' smartly dressed geriatric population of this small town. Apparently, according to a friendly local who chatted me up in line, West End Bakery has been there for about 80 years. So I guess when you have been in business that long, you have had ample time to get those recipes right, and trust me THEY HAVE.

There wasn't a bad one in the lot, but I think my favorite part of these donuts was how darn crispy they were on the bottom, even though the insides were soft and chewy and really perfect. I like to attribute this crispiness to the possibility that since they rock the time warp vibe in that town (and only accept cash, and they have no website for me to link to here), they are probably deep frying their donuts in deliciously banned forms of trans fat, like whale blubber or panda fat or something. And I APPRECIATED that because they were freaking phenomenal.

Here is what the kids thought: 


M, age 11: I thought that the donuts at this place were pretty good, and it was even better to eat them with my friends! I liked the one with the mousse or whatever on top, and I liked the twists. But the apple sauce donuts with caramel frosting were the BEST! Mmmm!!

L, age 8: They had the same amount of flavor as other places. But that's a good thing. It was a yummy place. I liked it. A person lives in a house right next to this bakery. They are lucky because they probably get donuts way more than we do.

K, age 6: I had the glazed. It was good. It was kind of soft on the inside and outside and I don't like soft donuts.

Bottom Line: Another Mixed Bag I guess, on account of K not appreciating their softness (wha!?) but this pains me as this place was really really good!