Modest House

For three years, Kingston's Bakehouse has quietly filled a void

Gene Padden

For more than three years, many a driver has cruised Kingston's Wyoming Avenue, peripherals actively scanning the storefronts and mini malls for a quick coffee and sandwich fix.



And three years ago, one of those passersby was Bakehouse owner Frank DeViva. A red-eyed bakery man who rolled from Forty Fort to Parsippany seven days a week, DeViva couldn't believe that Kingston, of all places, had missed the panini party.



"We just wanted a place to chill, and you had to go all the way up to Barnes & Noble by the arena to get a coffee and food," DeViva said. "So we're driving around, and my wife says, 'Why don't you open a store?'"



So he did. DeViva, who once held bakeries in Long Island and worked for Wegmans and gourmet groceries in New Jersey, took two years to put together the menu that would put Bakehouse - and Kingston - on the map.



"We figured I might as well work those 100 hours close to home," he said. "This is my passion. I enjoy the people end of it. I used to be doing 200 e-mails a day and I was removed from the customer.



"I prayed a lot. I put all this together, and I put it in the Lord's hands."



Bakehouse sits adjacent to Wyoming Avenue in United Penn Plaza, which also hosts Bistro Bistro, another one of the area's secrets. While often mistaken for a "volume" bakery, Bakehouse is a full-scale eatery with extensive breakfast, soup, sandwich, and salad menus.



DeViva explained that he has regular customers that pass through sometimes three times a day to grab gourmet coffees and espressos as well as bagels, personal pizzas, and gifts. DeViva doesn't mind comparisons his customers make to nearby chain Panera Bread.



"We have traditional baked items like muffins and bagels and all that, but there's no question people come here for our panini and our grilled sandwiches," he said. "The difference between us and that store is our menu is broader and deeper. For every three items they offer, we have seven or eight. And we bake everything, every day."



DeViva and his staff get cookin' at 3 a.m. daily for the morning rush, which starts around 6 a.m. Even then, there are stragglers who sneak in earlier because they smell the goods. For an eatery that's still very much a best-kept secret, its beginnings were too strong even to be considered an overnight success.



"Three days before we opened, I took the newspapers off the windows, and we already had customers walking in," said DeViva. "We were only in here practicing, and I had to rush out to the ATM and get money so they could buy the products.



"Even today, I still have new customers walking in here all the time, still, and they're talking about how they never knew this was here or they'll say they thought we were only a bakery."



Bakehouse also features menus of hearth-baked artisan breads; sweet stuff like cookies, brownies, turnovers and cinnamon buns; and assorted gourmet cheesecakes. While everything is baked on-site, the cheesecakes come from an award-winning baker elsewhere.



"We don't do our own cheesecakes," DeViva said. "Our oven is the size of a bedroom and it runs all day and it costs a lot to do that. Cheesecake is cooked at too low of a temperature. Eventually, we'll build a spot for cheesecakes."



DeViva's goal is to open 20 stores regionally, and to keep his headquarters local. Bits of the menu reflect the area, like the O'Reilly, Monte, Sem, and Kirby sandwiches (the Wyoming Valley West sandwich is still in production). Even the chips are manufactured by Route 11 Potato Chips, baked in Virginia and named after the 1,645-mile road that links Kingston to Louisiana - and Bakehouse to hungry drivers.