Ask Naperville baker Meghan Fiene what makes for a satisfying paczki and she says all the good stuff — lots of eggs, lots of butter, fried in house and freshly filled, down to pastry cream made with raw vanilla bean.
Take a bite and, done right, the Polish pastry is fluffy and rich, Fiene says.
Downright decadent.
It’s what makes Paczki Day Fiene’s favorite day of the year — seeing customers pour through her Naperville bakery’s doors to savor the pillowy dessert, paired with the satisfaction that she helped scratch that much-anticipated, sugar-powdered itch.
“I don’t know, I just love it,” Fiene said.
Like bakeries across the Chicago area, Fiene’s on North Aurora Road has been in the heat of preparations for Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, which this year is Feb. 13. But locally, the day of indulgence is better known as Paczki Day, when Polish doughnuts take over bakery cases and offer a time-honored pre-Lenten treat.
At Fiene’s, it’s been all hands on deck to get ready for the sweet celebration.
“I can’t even project the number of orders we’ll get,” Fiene said Thursday, taking a break from paczki prep, a dusting of powdered sugar covering her all black bakery T-shirt. “We’re still counting.”
Fiene’s Bakery has been a part of the local Paczki Day scene in Naperville since it opened in 2021.
Getting in on the tradition, Fiene said, was a must. Even if it meant learning what paczkis were all about, from their history to their ingredients.
Though a Naperville native, Fiene says she never really knew much about paczkis. It wasn’t until she launched her own bakery that she realized just how big they were in Chicago and its suburbs, which have long boasted large Polish populations.
For her first Paczki Day, Fiene said she took her time practicing so that “we had it absolutely perfect before any customers came around.”
In developing a recipe for her bakery, Fiene opted for “a very traditional” approach, she said. That entailed a rich, yeast dough that relies on two proofs before it’s fried and packed with various fruit and crème fillings — a three-hour undertaking from start to finish, Fiene reckons.
An exhaustive process, it takes “quite a bit of prep work,” Fiene said. That’s what the past week has been for, the days leading up to paczki rollout requiring a delicate dance between planning enough ahead while still keeping pastry elements as fresh as possible.
A tray of paczkis sits in a case Friday at Fiene’s Bakery in Naperville for those who want to indulge before Fat Tuesday. (Tess Kenny/Naperville Sun)
“Everything we make is from scratch, so the shelf life is pretty short and we want it fresh for our customers,” she said. Her whole bakery team helps where needed come Paczki Day, which is really a multiday affair.
Fiene started selling her pastries Friday.
One of her employees started celebrating a day before that.
For Caroline Lepak, a cake decorator at Fiene’s, Paczki Day is Fat Thursday, which is more common for Polish families like hers. Then, she’ll celebrate again Tuesday, when the holiday is more widely celebrated in the U.S.
Explaining the practice, Lepak, 21, said Paczki Day marks the end of celebrations in Poland that take place leading up to the 40-day Lenten season of fasting and reflection before Easter.
“It’s kind of one of our biggest appetizers or pleasures before we put off sweets for (Lent),” she said.
Paczkis originated as a way to use up butter, eggs and other ingredients that were off-limits through Lenten fasting. Lepak’s family eats them every year, she said, courtesy of her grandma and her parents. Flavor-wise, a family favorite is rose hip jam. Lepak added that paczkis filled through a jelly doughnut-like hole in the side are most traditional, as opposed to those that are cut and filled, often with whipped cream and strawberries.
This year is Lepak’s first watching the process from the inside of a bakery. She’s excited to see her family tradition come to life in a whole other way, she said.
“I have been around paczki before, and I know how to make them, but it’s going to be very cool to see how, in a bakery, everyone works together,” she said. “I heard it gets very busy.”
“Crazy busy” actually, according to Fiene. And that’s not even accounting for Valentine’s Day, which happens to fall the day after Paczki Day this year. The one-two punch for big holidays in the bakery world has made the start to this month especially “crazy,” Fiene said, but her team is managing well, she said.
DeEtta’s Bakery a few minutes away on West 5th Avenue says it’s the same for them.
“We’re a well-oiled machine,” owner Morgan Tyschper said, adding that Paczki Day, for her at least, is the real focus this week.
DeEtta’s, which has helped Naperville celebrate Paczki Day for the past decade, anticipates doling out some 15,000 to 20,000 of them this year. Unlike Fiene’s, though, DeEtta’s will be offering the pastries on Fat Tuesday only, a choice intended to lean into Paczki Day’s roots of using up rich ingredients before Lent’s kickoff on Ash Wednesday. Paczkis also will be the only item DeEtta’s sells Tuesday.
To manage what Tyschper called “quite the production,” baking will start in the middle of the night Monday.
She promised the frying would keep up through Tuesday to keep flavors continuously available but advised any paczki lovers with filling preferences to turn up early.
“When Paczki Day comes around, we have folks lining up very early in the morning, even before we open,” she said.
Tyschper recalled doing the same when she was little, waiting in line with her grandparents to grab her choice paczki. Her favorite is custard with a chocolate icing.
DeEtta’s will have that plus eight more flavors to choose from.
“We just absolutely love it,” Tyschper said. “It’s just a fun atmosphere with everyone. Not just the staff but the customers and everybody is just so excited about their paczki.”
If you can’t get to DeEtta’s or Fiene’s for your paczki, don’t fret. The western suburbs are chock full of options, including Firecakes Donuts in downtown Naperville, European Deli & Subs in Bolingbrook and many local grocery stores.
