While we pride ourselves in finding hidden secrets while traveling, sometimes you just have to do the most touristy thing around. In Lancaster, Pennsylvania, that means heading up to the town of Lititz & visiting the Sturgis Pretzel Bakery – aka the place where the hard pretzel was invented.
There is nothing that’s not touristy about visiting this place, yet it’s fantastic. For $3 a person, you’ll tour the original pretzel factory, learning how to make a soft pretzel & seeing the original ovens where hard pretzels were invented (way back in the day, soft pretzels ruled the world – hard pretzels were considered “burned” & thrown out – until someone decided that they actually tasted good).
A perk of visiting Sturgis Pretzel? The town of Lititz is actually really cute! Walk around the downtown area & check out all the cute shops & cafes.
Nothing wrong with visiting places we think more of as being tourist spots. I can’t think of food factories I’ve visited, but I’ve been to Busch brewery in St. Louis and Jack Daniels in Tennessee. I’d like to make it to that part of Pennsylvania sometime. That’s one of the great things about living in the Northeast — so many cool places to visit that aren’t far from home.
I love visiting breweries, regardless of how “famous” they are. My favorite brewery tour was Shipyard in Portland, Maine – LOTS of free samples :)