Best bakery
Just what does Mike's Pastry put in those cannoli? Considering the lines that spill from the counter out onto Hanover Street on any given evening, you'd think the deep-fried pastry shells were stuffed with fresh lottery tickets or molten gold instead of sweet ricotta. Ditto the special-occasion ricotta pies - laced with love potion, perhaps? And what about the mind-boggling rest: shelves and shelves of cakes and cookies, brownies and muffins, and Italian specialties such as sfogliatelle, marzipan, torrone, and more, over all of which you'll see customers hunching protectively at Mike's tiny tables? Sprinkled with fairy dust? More likely, they're simply yummy.

Hi-Rise Bakery gets as high a rise out of its customers as it does out of its dough. Customers' heated complaints have dogged the place since it opened - about the prices (prohibitive), the seating (limited), and above all the service (incompetent and insulting). Why, then, do they continue to patronize it at all, much less honor it with a "best of" award? Simple - its breads and sandwiches are peerless. Whatever can be done by hand, Rene Becker's purveyors and baking apprentices do, yielding loaves with just the right crumb, just the right crust - from whole wheat and rye to raisin-pecan, challah to brioche to fougasse. And however thickly it can be laid on, his counter staff lays it on, from smoked and grilled meats and veggies to artisanal cheeses to homemade dressings. For all the ire Becker's bakery raises, it has also raised our standards.

Mike's Pastry, 300 Hanover Street, Boston, (617)742-3050, www.mikespastry.com; Hi-Rise Bakery, 56 Brattle Street, Cambridge, (617) 492-3003, 208 Concord Avenue, Cambridge, (617) 876-8766.