Preparation for the bake sale begins weeks in advanced. The majority of the volunteers were busy rolling lefse in the church’s kitchen for an upcoming bake sale.

For those unfamiliar, lefse is best described as a Norwegian flat bread, or a Norwegian tortilla made out of potato. It’s made by weighing or measuring out the dough into small balls, then it’s rolled it out into a thin circle, and fried on each side on the lefse griddle, and turned with a lefse stick.

“Make sure you put it’s made out of a potato,” said Corkie Tietel.

“Actually, my grandma always said there’s as many lefse recipes as there are lefse makers, so you’ll find a lot of different kinds of lefse, especially in Norway. Here you’ll find plain lefse or potato lefse. Plain lefse would be here, regionally,” said Anette Haynes.

Lefsa is cooked on a Lefsa griddle and flipped with a Lefsa stick right when it bubbles and starts to get brown.

“I’ve been making lefse since I was a kid, since grandma would let me roll,” said Lynne Hoeft.

Lefse can be eaten plain right out of the fridge or with butter and cinnamon. Sometimes people eat it with turkey mashed potatoes, or just butter.

“We’ve used 100 pounds of potatoes,” said Anette Haynes.

The real potato Lefse, made with– potatoes, cream, sugar, butter, and flower right before you roll it–will be the star of the bake sale, with 6 rounds to a packet, but there will also be cookies, homemade breads, caramels, honey wheat bread, apple pies, peach pies, apple crisp, and peach crisp, krumkake, and pizzelle.

WELCA is hosting the bake sale on Saturday, from 9 am to 12 pm, Saturday, Nov. 8 at Our Savior’s Lutheran Church. There will be coffee and coffee cake available for socializing beforehand at 8:30 am. All proceeds go back into the community.

Brenda Ruch flips lefse with a traditional lefse stick.

“It will go towards groups like Brown County Family Service, Brown County Bridge on Center, Living Meadows, Operation Concern, Ivy House, Blessed Bottoms, NUMAS House, Green Lake Bible Camp, Kikatiti,” said Betty Sauers.

Brittney Lilleodden, age 13, helps make lefsa with Our Savior’s WELCA group early las Saturday morning.

Rolling lefsa – the secret is to roll it so thin the writing on the mat is visible.

Deb Kaehler carefully weighs lefsa balls, which are then rolled and fried.