Honeycomb Bakery rises above in DeWitt

TOWN OF DEWITT – Though it opened in the thick of the COVID pandemic in November 2020, Honeycomb Bakery has had no trouble drawing in or keeping a customer base.
Toward the very beginning the DeWitt bakery was already known to have early morning lines stretching around the Kinney Drugs end of Nottingham Plaza and occasionally to the entrance of the Pink Pug pet groomer, but with the lightening of capacity restrictions has come a steadier, more “mellowed out” flow of patronage day to day, said co-owner Kayla Brandt.
“It’s been an adventure,” she said, adding that her pastry shop was required to keep the amount of people in the establishment under 10 for a time, a factor that made them cut down on employment as customers often waited outside the door in the cold.
Nonetheless, Brandt said the work environment has remained fun, relaxed and comfortable, mainly because she co-owns Honeycomb with her father, Chuck, while her sisters Nicole and Maria, her stepmother and a bevy of close friends help to run it behind the counter.
Kayla Brandt was previously in charge of the now-closed Picasso’s Pastries on Westcott Street, where a following of sorts began growing over the course of its five years despite an acknowledged shortage of parking.
She then took a hiatus to travel across Europe, along the way learning different baking techniques in northern Italy, southern France, Iceland, Poland, the Netherlands and parts of Germany.
Upon her return, she experimented in the kitchen, started a family, and chose to open a brand new bakery while pregnant with a baby boy.
Located in the plaza spot formerly occupied by a Supercuts hair salon, Honeycomb Bakery makes most everything from scratch. Its assortment of goods ranges from cookies, cakes, pies, muffins and morning buns to seasonal favorites like pumpkin doughnuts and staples like pistachio croissants and cheese rolls.
With an emphasis on doughs and a distaste for the freezing of its products, the bakery focuses on rolling and portioning out its treats by hand—a process Kayla Brandt sees as “meditative.” Through muscle memory, anywhere from 175 to 250 croissants are made a day on average in the shop’s 12-by-20 kitchen, all without the use of a tabletop dough sheeter.
“We don’t skimp on ingredients whatsoever either, because quality is first things first,” Chuck Brandt said. “All of our chocolates are Belgian and we use a special butter for all of our croissant dough, which is twice the cost of regular but there’s a difference.”
Seeking to continue her family’s tradition of homesteading, Kayla Brandt said she’s on a mission to preserve eggs and grow fruits on her own land. In addition, she has hopes that her newborn son will one day be a baker himself.
Honeycomb Bakery is open Wednesday through Friday 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.