LANSING, Mich. — Fat Tuesday in Mid-Michigan is underway and donut shops are already lined up with customers trying to get some paczki.
Quality Dairy is baking thousands of paczki ahead of Fat Tuesday.Paczki are a pastry, often with a filling, regularly eaten on Fat Tuesday. Fat Tuesday is the precursor to the Lenten season, and the paczki are seen as an indulgence before the traditional 40-day period of fasting before Easter.
Paczki are a Polish food but reportedly became popular in Midwestern cities in the 1880s because of a large population of Polish immigrants.
At Groovy Donuts in East Lansing, owner Andrew Gauthier says they have been preparing for Fat Tuesday and the influx of customers since Monday morning.
"We're looking at 1,500-2,000 paczki in orders alone and probably in the neighborhood of 4,000 or 5,000 more for our regular customers today.
Another Michigan staple, Quality Dairy, says they estimate they make 500,000 paczki every year.
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