The iconic windmill festooned with hex signs and touting its shoo-fly pies that has stood along Lincoln Highway East in East Lampeter Township is officially up for sale.
Dutch Haven Shoofly Pie Bakery, which is considered Route 30’s original Amish store, closed its doors on Jan. 1 and is now listed for sale for $2.4 million through Lancaster-based Kingsway Realty.
According to online histories, the business was established in 1946 as Lancaster’s first Amish tourist attraction and became known for its shoo-fly pie recipe, offering free samples to customers and shipping pies across the country. Time magazine labeled it “America’s best shoo-fly pie” and won prominent admirers, including Sen. Doug Mastriano who retold the story while on the campaign trail for governor of Pennsylvania of going on one of the first dates with his now wife, Rebecca, at Dutch Haven and trying the pie.
The business has caught the attention of the public in recent years as well. Members of the popular History Channel show “Pawn Stars” stopped at the bakery in August, posting pictures on social media. An employee of the business was also interviewed for an episode of the show.
The first Dutch Haven started in the 1920s as a luncheonette serving Pennsylvania Dutch food, including shoo-fly pie.
Current owner, Paul Stahl, took over the business in 1991, closing the restaurant and focusing on the bakery and gift shop.
Besides shoo-fly pies and other baked goods, Dutch Haven carried thousands of kitschy tourist items related to Lancaster County, including “I love Intercourse” T-shirts, mugs and magnets, local furniture, hex signs and jams and jellies.
An outdoor Amish furniture store behind the bakery, Amish Stuff Etc., remains open.
The windmill that served as a distinctive marker for local residents and tourists on Route 30 was reportedly built as an homage to the “Dutch” label of the Pennsylvania Dutch, combining it with the windmill culture of the Netherlands. The blades of the windmill still turn and light up at night.
The property sale includes five buildings on 3.5 acres, bakery equipment, fixtures, recipes for the shoo-fly pie and existing inventory, according to the listing. The main 7,000 square-foot building houses the bakery and gift shop with a 96-pie capacity commercial oven, a commercial mixer, pie presses and other equipment.
The former Jakey’s Amish BBQ, a 112-seat restaurant, is also included in the sale.
Staff writer Michael Yoder is an award-winning journalist who has been honored with several Keystone Press Awards for his investigative pieces.
This is hard for myself and my family, We have bought the pies from here since the 50’s. we want someone to buy it if for nothing else to at least make the best shoefly pie anywhere!!!!!
They had great pies!
My wife Carolann has been coming here since she was a little girl. She remembers having meals in the restaurant. She introduced me to Lancaster when we first started dating. We both love lancaster and come here at least 5 times a year. Dutch Haven was a mandatory stop on the way home to pick up the shoe fly and other pies. My wife had admired a hand painted ceramic duck in the window since a child. Every time we went there for the past 30 years, I tried to get them to sell it to me. They told me none of the figurines in the window were for sale. We’ll, one day I asked as usual and to my surprise I was able to by the duck she loved. It now is proudly on display in our home. A little girl’s dream come true 50 years later. Thank you Dutch Haven!!!!!
https://www.bizbuysell.com/Business-Opportunity/dutch-haven-shoofly-pie-bakery/2036001/
Now $1,500,000
We go every he here one of our FAVORITE places we were shocked and sadden to find out that it closed we go every April.. Was the BEST place!! WHAT A DISGRACE ANOTHER ICON GONE FKR GREED!
oh no.. I loved this place and bought a gorgeous amethyst cathedral for $1200..
Where did all the merchandise go??I want to find out so I can go shopping.
I live in NJ
I grew up back east and have been eating Dutch Haven shoofly pie my entire life. It is, in fact, my favorite pie. Alas, I may have the last official Dutch Haven shoofly pie in my freezer here in Elk, WA! Now I don’t know whether to eat it as a last goodbye or put it on Ebay with a $1,000,000 reserve.
Than you for years of great service. If it wasn’t for tasting a sample of your pie we wouldn’t have returned for the last 20 years to continue having the best pie around. Thank you so much for keeping your recipe genuine. You will be truly missed. God bless.
Patrick bentz.
No mention that this was a family owned business. The Weaver family built it after buying the gas station from a former owner in the early 1940’s. My grandparents built the business and I worked there from ’66 to 1975. My grandmother came up with the recipe for the shoo-fly pies. We could make 292 pies at one time and we ran the ocean sometimes 12 hours a day. We also mailed the pies all over the US.