Patty Loew:
Lent begins Thursday, and that means giving up sweets for some Christians. And that means no paczkis. You’ve never heard of them? Just watch. Andy Soth will soon have you craving the Polish pastry that is the pride of Pulaski.

Man:
Paczki Day is the day before Lent. The middle of winter on a Tuesday? Why not, why not a paczki.

Woman:
It’s similar to a Bismarck but it's richer with more butter.

Man:
Flour, sugar, eggs, butter, yeast, salt -- it's an old family recipe. It's a fantastic recipe.

Woman:
One is not enough anymore.

Man:
We’ll draw people from the UP, from the Fox River valley, Fond du Lac, from Milwaukee, Chicago even we had. It's a long process. We started 1:00 Monday morning. Sleep’s overrated.

Woman:
One raspberry.

Man:
We pretty much stuck to the base. We had so many people asking for chocolate.

Man:
Some of the traditionalists come in and they are like, ahh, that's not a paczki, what are you doing? It’s either prune or it’s plain. I’m like, I’ve got your prune, don’t worry. These are ready to go and those aren't too far behind. We'll take these to the front. You get the nice round pillow for the paczkis, which means “little package” in Polish. They joke about it, it's not just another jelly donut. Once they taste it, they realize. That's the way a paczki is supposed to look. That's why we do it.   

Patty Loew:
Greg Smoeraba says his family bakery sold more than 12,000 paczkis just before Lent last year.