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- Gesine Confectionary
& Gourmet Market - Patrons line up outside the door of Gesine Confectionary and Gourmet Market — and it's not just to catch a glimpse of co-owner Gesine Prado, an accomplished baker who also happens to be the sister of actress Sandra Bullock. The customers queue up because the petite bakery on Elm Street is chock full of delights, both sweet and savory.
- Crisp panini sandwiches on homemade foccacia come with veggie chips or as part of a "boxed lunch" that includes a pair of chocolate chip cookies. The "Liffey" is thinly sliced roast beef and pastrami with caramelized onions and a béchamel sauce. The "Bayern" pairs organic chicken slices with sweet lingonberry compote and oozing slices of brie.
- Chewy little macaroons, the bakery's signature sweet, come in three flavors: lemon, "Montpelier maple" and mocha. Then there's the gleaming pastry case with a plethora of other fanciful baked goods, including dense pumpkin cheesecakes topped with chocolate swirls and Belgian chocolate cakes iced with ganache. Biting into a pistachio Savarin — two pale green meringue "cookies" with lavender-colored black raspberry butter cream layered between — is like eating a cloud.
- For a companion caffeine fix, Gesine offers a selection of carefully brewed coffee drinks, made with beans from Vermont Artisan Coffee & Tea in Waterbury. Italian sodas add to the café ambiance, while shelves along one wall proffer a quirky selection of high-end groceries, including fancy Italian pasta and jars of puttanesca sauce, licorice reindeer, imported olive oils, Stirrings drink mixers and even selected wines.
- A few lucky customers land seats at Gesine and observe the parade of fans satisfying their sweet tooth. But the place is so busy, most folks get their treats to go.
- — SUZANNE PODHAIZER
- Gesine Confectionary & Gourmet Market
279 Elm Street, Montpelier, 224-9930 
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photo: matthew thorsen
