The Brick Store

21 Lisbon Rd., Bath, NH - (603) 747-2074

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Posted By Michael Stern on July 26, 2007 2:10 AM

The Brick Store opened in 1790 and has been in business every since then, making it America’s oldest general store. One of its most fascinating features are its slant-front counters, designed so that ladies wearing hoop skirts can step close and examine the merchandise. It truly smells old, in the nicest possible way, its air filled with the piquant aromas of thick-sliced bacon, aged cheese, maple candy, and cake donuts. The most alluring odor, and one that permeates the very fixtures of the store, is that of the smokehouse, which produces the vividly-flavored bacon, Canadian bacon, and cheddar cheese. Also enticing is the scent of sweet fudge, made in flavors that include maple walnut, Creamsicle, Heath Bar crunch, and vanilla rum raisin.

A true general store rather than a restaurant, The Brick Store carries soaps, weathervanes, cookbooks and candies, as well as Live Free or Die t-shirts (the state motto). Although gift baskets of "Yankee breakfast" are available (pancake batter, maple spread, syrup, and bacon), thereis no actual meal service on premises. Still, it is possible to put together a dandy impromptu repast from its wide inventory of cheeses, Vermont crackers, and smoked meats, then commandeer one of the comfortable chairs on the front porch and dine in sight of Route 302. We walked out with bags of old-fashioned store crackers, smoked pepperoni sticks, hunks of cheddar, and a pound of maple brittle.

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Posted By John Hinsley on July 1, 2011 6:02 PM

The smoked items are wonderful. I just had the bacon for breakfast. What flavor! (Nothing in the supermarket is bacon any more.) The smoker sits in the alley next to the building. The aroma will draw you in if you will only stop at what is really just a wide spot in the road.

Nice folks behind the counter, too, and a better grade of tourist junk than you will find elsewhere. Don't forget to visit the covered bridge behind the building and the ice cream parlor next door.

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smoked meat

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