Skip to main content

Pre-order for Saturday by Thursday at 6 p.m. Sourdough sells out.

Penny LarkBakehouse

Open Wednesday to Sunday from 6:30 a.m.

Bread worth getting up early for.

Slow sourdough, laminated pastry and good coffee, baked every morning on Millrace Street. Come by while it’s warm, or order ahead and skip the line.

Order ahead See the menu
  • 212 Millrace StreetTwo doors from the library
  • 555-0142Call before noon for tomorrow
  • 36-hour sourdoughFlour, water, salt, time
Illustration: a round sourdough loaf, a croissant and a steaming cup on a counter, framed by an arched window at sunrise.

This week’s bake

Out of the oven, October 7 to 11

The regulars are here every day. These four change with the week and what the orchard and the mill send us.

  • Every day

    Millrace country loaf

    Our house sourdough. Open crumb, dark crust, keeps for four days wrapped in a towel.

    $9 whole · $5 half

  • This week

    Apple and rye

    Dark rye with roasted Northern Spy apples and caraway. Very good with sharp cheddar.

    $11

  • Weekends

    Brown butter croissant

    Three days of folding for about ninety seconds of eating. Out at 7 a.m., usually gone by 10.

    $4.75

  • This week

    Pumpkin seed morning bun

    Cardamom sugar, toasted seeds, a little orange zest. Made without nuts or sesame.

    $4.25

See the full menu with prices and allergens

Order ahead

Reserve your loaf. We’ll set it aside.

No account, no app. Tell us what you want and when, pay at the counter when you pick up.

  1. Choose

    Pick your bread and pastry and a pick-up day.

  2. We confirm

    You get a text or an email back within a few hours.

  3. Pick up

    Your name is on the bag by the register. Pay then.

Orders for Saturday close Thursday at 6 p.m. Larger orders for an office or an event: call 555-0142.

Your order

What would you like? Choose any

This is an example site. Nothing you type is sent anywhere; only the pick-up day reaches the next page.

Hours and location

Find us on Millrace Street

Opening hours
DayHours
MondayClosed
TuesdayClosed
Wednesday6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Thursday6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Friday6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Saturday7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Sunday7 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Closed Thanksgiving Day. Open until noon on Christmas Eve for pre-orders only.

Address
212 Millrace Street, Alder Bend
Parking
Free two-hour street parking on Millrace, and the public lot behind the library on Tanner Alley. There is a bike rack by our door.
Getting in
The front door is level with the sidewalk and opens with a push button. The counter has a lowered section on the left.
Street map: the bakehouse is on the north side of Millrace Street between Third Avenue and Tanner Alley, two doors east of the library, one block north of the river. Millrace Street Hollis Street Library Public lot Tanner Park Alder River Third Avenue Tanner Alley
We are the brick-red building two doors east of the library. Look for the lark on the sign.

Our story

A bakery because the town needed one

When the old Millrace bakery closed, Alder Bend went four years buying bread in plastic. Odile Marchetti had spent those years baking overnight shifts in the city and driving home as the sun came up. In 2019 she signed the lease, borrowed an oven and named the place after the bird that sings before dawn.

There are six of us now. We mill a third of our flour ourselves, buy the rest from a family mill forty miles north, and start every loaf a day and a half before you eat it. We don’t do much else, and we like it that way.

Odile and the morning crew