Meandering Michigan Series: Roma Bakery, Lansing

For those of you that have not visited Roma Bakery and Deli in Lansing, you are missing out! Sostine and Mena Castriciano have owned and operated this family business since 1969. Roma is well known in Lansing for European style breads, rum cake tortes, cannoli, almond paste cookies and many other favorites. Roma services many local business with bread including Horrocks, Kings Subs, King of the Grill, Franks and Merindorf 's. You may have had a sandwich on their bread already unknowingly.

I recently stopped into Roma, I hadn't been there is probably twenty years or more. I've tried to stop in a few times in the last couple of months, but haven't been able to make it before closing. This week, I finally had the opportunity to make it in. The store is small but full of exceptional food and worth the visit.

My dad and I stopped in to look around. I was very impressed with the selection of products and brands on the few small grocery aisles. They offer pasta sauces, pastas, rice, grains, oils, breading, olives, pickles, candies, cookies, and many other selections.


The deli offers fine meats, cheeses, and olives. There are also dine-in or take out options for salads including Garden, Greek, Pasta, and Antipasto as well as specialty subs and other daily specials.

When you move from the deli to the baked goods and desserts, you can easily be overwhelmed by the offerings. There are doughnuts, cookies, fruit tarts, eclairs, biscottis, cannolis, brownies, and of course rum cake tortes in probably ten or more flavors. I chose a spumoni torte, my dad chose a turtle like cake, and I selected a brownie to take home to my husband. The torte surprised me because I didn't realize it was a rum torte. The frosting was thick, rich and creamy. The torte was moist and full of flavor with four layers. My father and husband very much enjoyed their desserts as well.

The refridgerated and frozen section includes Roma's homemade products including pasta sauces, tortellinis, raviolis, manicottis and other pastas. There are also frozen pierogis to take home, one of my all time favorites! The pierogies come in several flavors from chedder, potato and onion, to bacon.

Roma also has a very large selection of cakes, ready for you to take home. You can also pick up a copy of Mena Castriciano's cook book of her favorite Italian receipes from Calabria & Sicily.

More information can be found on Roma's website, Facebook or Twitter.
http://romabakerydeli.com/

More to come from the mind of ...