Downtown bakery owner eyes Jan. 15 opening

Napoleons will be among the European-style baked goods served at La Vanilla Bean Patisserie on Park Avenue

Work is due to start the Monday after Thanksgiving on a new European-style bakery at the corner of Park Avenue and B Street.

Kay Lynn Broadhead, owner of La Vanilla Bean Patisserie, said she is shooting for a Jan. 15, 2013 opening. The business, in the old A Street Games location, will focus on European style pastries (tarts, torts, Napoleons, eclairs, scones), and will also provide specialty cakes and lunch.

Broadhead was a communications professor at Idaho State University for 20 years before she took early retirement in 2010 to attend the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier, Vt. When she returned to Idaho she had her eye on Boise, and even had a storefront lined up. But the deal fell through, and when she started looking at other places she was approached by the Greater Idaho Falls Chamber of Commerce and the Downtown Development Corp.

"I've got a very good feeling about what's happening with the downtown here," she said. Broadhead will be assisted in the business by Jessica Carson.