Lindstrom Bakery with Minnesota's 'best' doughnuts has new owners with cafe dreams

When Lindstrom Bakery reopened Tuesday from its annual January hiatus, everything about the place was the same. The nationally acclaimed "Scandinavian doughnut" was still on the menu. Folgers was still being brewed. And longtime owner Bernie Coulombe was still there — except, she was in a new role.

She was training a new team of bakers, now that the nearly 50-year-old bakery has changed hands and Coulombe is heading into retirement.

When a Forest Lake couple learned that the bakery was for sale last fall, they decided to make a longtime fantasy of running their own cafe come true.

"It's something we had half-jokingly dreamed about for the better part of a decade," said Angie Richey. As "morning people," she and her husband, Eric, made a point to stop into breakfast spots anywhere they traveled. They'd consider the menu, even the napkins, and imagine all the elements they'd bring into their own place.

The decision to go for it "just felt right," said Richey, who has worked in food service for more than a decade.

But first, they had to learn the recipes, which Coulombe was passing along with the bakery. Those include the famed doughnut, named Minnesota's best by Food & Wine magazine.

Continuity is important, Richey said. Customers "want their doughnut exactly the same shade of golden brown. There's a certain timing to everything, and Bernie just knows it. I don't even think there are times on her recipes. She knows when it's done. It's going to be a lot to learn from someone doing it for so long."

For one thing, "I'm a coffee snob," Richey said. When the Folgers finally runs out, a Lindstrom-based brand, Northwoods Roasterie, will be providing the beans.

The new owners launched a website, a first for the decidedly analog bakery, where orders were always written down on carbon copy paper.

Next up will be the addition of a patio this summer, with long-term plans to redo the interior and expand the kitchen in order to turn the place into a full-scale cafe that serves salads, soups, grain bowls and other farm-to-table offerings.

Finally, a name change is on the horizon. The bakery/cafe concept together will be known as the Good Neighbor — a name Richey picked out when the idea of owning a cafe was only a dream.

The whole changeover could take three to four years, Richey said.