Incredibly Delicious

BEST BAKERY
Incredibly Delicious 925 S 7th St 528-8548 www.incrediblydelicious.com Apparently we don’t need to sell you on Incredibly Delicious, since it’s our perennial winner and this year is no exception. But we will anyway. They may be known for their dessert treats, fresh-baked breads, and express breakfasts of coffee and croissants, but their lunch items are just as good. We generally cross our fingers that the fig and brie sandwich is on the menu, but any of the sandwiches or fresh salads listed will be excellent. For dessert, lately we’ve been addicted to the flourless turtle cake and the mixed berry tarts with apricot glaze, and craving the hazelnut cream puff. Again, we’re preaching to the heavily voting choir, but Incredibly Delicious is amazingly delectable.

BEST BAKERY (runner-up)
Café Moxo 411 E Adams St 788-8084 www.cafemoxo.com Your runner-up in this category is Café Moxo, which has one of the friendliest staffs we’ve come across. When they ask how your lunch tastes, they genuinely want to know, then they’ll tell you a story about how it came about, mostly from the staff members themselves. Says owner Mark Forinash, “Mostly people tell us about things they’ve had in the past and we just mess around with it. It’s a lot of trial and error. We never know on any given day what new things we’ll have.” For dessert, grab one of their famous giant cupcakes (or one of the vastly more manageable but equally famous normal-sized cupcakes), silk tarts or cookies. Whether you go for breakfast, lunch or just coffee and a cookie, you’ll leave very happy.

BEST BAKERY (runner-up)
The Bakery 2028 S 15th St. 522-3100 Though it only opened in November of last year, The Bakery, owned by Humphrey’s Market, is another strong contender in this category. Designed to create a perfect slice of a simpler time, at The Bakery you will genuinely believe you’ve Quantum Leaped yourself into the past. Greg Harrison creates delicious pastries while Scott Beard handles breads and hot breakfast and lunch items. Scott credits his small but “wonderful crack crew” for keeping things running as well as they do. Their breakfasts are crazy cheap (a short stack of pancakes for $1.29!), and their newly added salad bar is a perfect lunch by itself, or a nice add-on to a sandwich or horseshoe. Dessert-wise, everything is that special homemade kind of delicious, but the cream puffs are especially heavenly. Fun fact: The Bakery’s donuts are made by Brian Moore, saxophone player for The Groove Daddies. Yes, they are the only place in town, possibly the world, to sell rock star donuts.