Festival visitors will have their senses on overdrive as the aromas of fresh baked breads and other Pa Dutch treats fill the air. The Festival Bake Oven combines some of the most tempting hearth baked goods, while giving spectators a look back in time at traditional outdoor baking techniques.

With its limestone foundation, brick hearth, and red clay tiled roof, it is a classic example of early 1800's, Southeastern Pennsylvania, architecture. Early farmsteads were almost always laid our with a separate stand alone bake oven or summer kitchen that would house a large walk-in fireplace complete with a smaller sized baking area within.

Early each morning bake oven tender, Gary Hertzog, builds his first of many large wood fires directly on the oven's hearth (baking area). Baking on the principles of "retained heat", Gary will "knock down" or clear out all the remaining ash and embers from the hearth area once the oven has reached the desired temperature.

Items requiring the highest amount of heat such as our famous, high-top round bread loaves are loaded and baked first. When the bread is finished baking, and removed from the oven, items requiring less heat such as pies or our giant iced cinnamon buns are loaded into the oven and baked on the heat from the original fire.

Traditionally, after removing the items from the second bake, food staples requiring even less heat would be placed into the oven. Fruits or vegetables to be dried would be one example. At the Festival Gary will do up to six "fires" in one day allowing for as many as eight to twelve separate "bakes" on any given day. Doing this many "bakes" in an oven that can hold up to sixty loaves of bread certainly allows for many a Festival visitors to take home a tasty and traditional treat!