Virtuoso Breadworks

Description: Located in Waxhaw, North Carolina, Virtuoso serves artisan bread and pastries with a twist of our own signature flavor. We also serve espresso, drip coffee, iced chai, and naturally sugared soda.

Comments: I came here for cinnamon rolls not expecting it to also be a third place. So, I was pleasantly surprised walking in to see people sitting all around with their friends and loved ones, chatting, eating pastries, drinking coffee, and enjoying life. It’s in a converted house that’s pretty small, but they manage to have enough seating that Waxhaw families seem to regularly come here to hangout. So much so that they have coloring books for kids.

It’s a bakery known for its bread. Sourdough, focaccia, brioche, croissants, and more. But idgaf about all that, I came for their cinnamon rolls. At first glance, you might mistake it for a coffee roll, which is a doughnut, not a cinnamon roll. But upon closer inspection, there’s no doubt that what they serve here is a proper cinnamon roll.

They opt for icing instead of cream cheese frosting, which means its best enjoyed warm (you can have a room temp cinnamon roll with cream cheese frosting, and it’ll taste fine, but icing demands warmth to shine). Once you warm this, it’s solid. Not transcendent, but solid. I still have Honeybear Bake Shop as my top spot in the region, with Sunflour Bakery and Beyond Amazing Doughnuts right behind them. That said, there’s so many third places in Waxhaw with cinnamon rolls that the whole city is worth a day trip. Just check the map (shout out the greatest map of all time).

Anyways, they also serve coffee and tea and have Wi-Fi, so if you can snag a spot, it’s not a bad place to study, work, or read. Just bring noise canceling headphones because it’s small to the point of being able to hear everyone in the house at all times.