Trenary Toast Cafe Review: A Giant Cinnamon Roll in Downtown Marquette

We stopped at Trenary Toast Cafe in downtown Marquette, Michigan, meaning to grab a quick snack on the way to the gym. It did not stay a snack. It turned into a full, late breakfast, a table of syrup-covered things and a cinnamon roll that took up most of the plate, and we were so full afterward that we skipped the gym. This was also one of our very first videos. Part of the point was to practice recording and editing, and making it taught us a lot about microphones and editing. It was the start of us figuring out how to make the channel.

Watch the full video on YouTube.

Quick facts

• Where: 153 W. Washington Street, on the corner of Third and Washington in downtown Marquette, Michigan. It's in Marquette, not in the town of Trenary.
• Who runs it: it's the Marquette cafe of Trenary Home Bakery, the bakery in Trenary that makes Trenary toast. It opened in 2021.
• The plan vs. what happened: a quick snack on the way to the gym turned into a full, late breakfast, and we skipped the gym.
• What we ordered: French toast with bacon, and a cinnamon roll with coffee. We shared the cinnamon roll.
• The cinnamon roll: much bigger than we expected. On camera it got "incredible, it's crispy and delicious."
• Trenary toast: a dry, twice-baked cinnamon toast that Finnish immigrants brought to the Upper Peninsula. You dunk it in coffee.
• Our verdict: in the video we called it worth the visit if you're in the mood for a homemade brunch.

First, what Trenary toast is

The cafe takes its name from Trenary toast, a twice-baked cinnamon sugar toast that came to Michigan's Upper Peninsula with Finnish immigrants. Around here it is a staple: hard, dry, made for dunking in coffee, and sold in paper bags like contraband. Trenary Toast Cafe builds on that heritage, so the menu leans Scandinavian and the coffee culture is taken seriously. Dunking is not optional, it is the whole point.

The breakfast we actually ordered

The menu goes well past the baked goods. What was supposed to be a snack became French toast with bacon, a cinnamon roll, coffee, and a lot of syrup. In the video we called it a tasty homemade brunch, and the cozy feel hits you the moment you walk in.

The cinnamon roll situation

Then the cinnamon roll. This was the biggest either of us has seen: a plate-filling spiral that could pass for a birthday cake if you put candles on it. We split one and it still defeated us. The verdict on camera was "incredible, it's crispy and delicious." Whether one person could finish one alone remains an open research question. We were not brave enough to run the experiment.

Walking off the damage in downtown Marquette

The gym was clearly off, so we walked instead. Downtown Marquette is an easy place to wander: a compact stretch of shops and old sandstone buildings that rolls downhill toward Lake Superior, with the water showing up at the end of the cross streets. It is the kind of downtown where a walk with no destination still works out, and after that cinnamon roll, the hill on the way back up felt like fair punishment.

On camera we called Marquette a lovely small town that sometimes feels like you're in a movie. We didn't buy a bag of Trenary toast on this stop. This one was all about the cafe.

The whole stop, roll reveal included, is in the vlog. Watch it on YouTube. We also send a short weekly newsletter about where we are and what broke this week. The signup form is on our newsletter page.