Machesney Park bakery sees lines out the door for pączkis, Valentine’s Day

MACHESNEY PARK, Ill. (WIFR) - People lined up outside a Machesney Park bakery Tuesday hoping to buy sweets for this holiday-filled week.

By the Dozen Bakery stocked up on heart-shaped cookies and cakes, chocolate-covered strawberries and pączkis.

“With it being Pączki Day, we’ve had a line out the door all morning, and we do have the Valentine’s stuff ready to go,” bakery owner Brent Nelson said. “The way Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras and Valentine’s fell, we had to have it all out on the shelves.”

A pączki (sounds like puhnch·kee) is a pastry similar to a doughnut filled with jelly. Mardi Gras, which means Fat Tuesday, is a day where people traditionally indulge in foods limited during the Christian holiday of Lent.

Nelson said Easter will be the bakery’s next big holiday.