Photo Friday (Vol. LIV) ['hidden treasure' edition]

Sorry about how late this is going up today.  Zahava gave her blessing to my going out for breakfast with a few blogger buddies (Chayei Sarah, Ben Chorin and the visiting MO Chassid) at Cafe Hillel in Jerusalem.  This was an incredibly generous gesture on Zahava's part because she is suffering with what I had last week... and I was leaving most of my pre-Shabbat chores over until I returned from Jerusalem (something that makes her bananas).

Well, I'm back... the Cholent is up... the dishes are washed (most of them anyway) and I can finally post a couple of pictures.

This Blogger breakfast we had is the second time this particular quartet has assembled for morning nourishment at this same spot in the trendy German Colony.  It seems our meetings are destined to revolve around MO Chassid visits to the holy land.

During breakfast Ben got a call from his lovely wife asking him to pick up some challah for shabbat.  This reminded me that my lovely wife made a similar request before I left the house.  Sarah was nice enough to recommend one of Jerusalem's hidden treasures; the Par Bakery on 'HaMagid Street' not far from where we were seated.

Not only had I never heard of this bakery, but in a million years I would never have found it without Sarah's able guidance.  You have to go up one alley off of Emek Refa'im and then turn left onto HaMagid which is essentially another glorified alley.  You walk past the back of several stores and houses and weave around road construction and a few creatively parked cars and there you are... a literal hole in the wall!  If you look closely you can see the spot just inside the doorway where these three anonymous bloggers had just been standing!

Yes, this little hole in a stone wall is it... the famous Par Bakery.  I have a feeling that the two white nylon temporary signs are a recent move away from complete anonymity chic!

I wasn't impressed at this point but we ventured inside anyway.  As you can see here, it was much more impressive once we'd gone into the hole (/sarcasm):

But as we inched further inside, some heavenly smells began to whisper promises of freshly baked things full of sugar and yeast!  But so far no bakery:

Suddenly the corner was turned and We were looking into about 3 square yards of space surrounded by shelves and racks of challah, kugel and pastry.  You could comfortably fit about 5 - 7 people inside at any one time, but the closeness just added to the concentration of delicious smells and eye-catching comfort food.

Once inside you don't know where to look first, but I was fortunate to catch this artfully lettered sign (I ended up buying two of the Shgarless Challas):

For this last shot I went back and stood in the doorway (the one in the second photo) and took in the Par Bakery in all its grandeur (note: my camera's auto-focus malfunctioned in this shot and inexplicably blurred the only 3 people present who blog anonymously!):

I resisted temptation and only picked up the requested Challah and a chocolate coffee cake for shabbat morning (for the kids!!!).  If I can ever figure out how to get back to this hidden treasure, it may just become my new favorite bakery!

Shabbat shalom!