Galveston – On the corner of 39th Street and Avenue N in Galveston, you’ll find a regular ol’ shopping center that doesn’t really have any signs, but boy does it have some smells.
This is where you’ll find Good Dough Kolache Bakery, and owner Mary Bass has reeled in one heck of reputation faster than it takes to cook batch of these beyond beautiful baked goods. “We kind of are a ghost kitchen in the sense that you can’t even find us,” said Mary, the owner and chef of Good Dough. Mary is a classically trained chef and teacher of culinary arts, and she’s got a long family history here on the Island.
“I am a fifth generation Galvestonian,” said Mary. “The oldest home on the island, which is the Menard house, was my great-grandfather’s home. He was the police chief in the 1900 storm. Henry Ketchum is his name. So, we’ve got really cool, awesome Galveston history.”
In March of 2021, Mary brought together some of her students and opened the Good Dough Kolache Bakery. Kolache’s are a staple in many Texan’s morning diets, but these aren’t your run of the mill breakfast pastries. “We do not make a traditional Texas sausage kolache,” said Mary. “We take homage to the traditional kolache that has the poppy seed, and prune and apricot. That’s our old west. Then we do all the fun and funky, all the flavors that are super unique.”
One would assume that kolache purists think Good Dough is not worth the dough, but oh no. Mary and her crew took their kolaches to one of the biggest kolache showdowns in the Lone Star State just months after opening their store. “That September we entered the Caldwell Kolache Festival, and we won Grand Champion with our brisket kolache,” said Mary. “We were not even open a year yet.”
The Caldwell Kolache Festival is no joke, and the bakers who enter the competition take it just as seriously as the pitmasters competing in some of the major BBQ competitions across the state. Winning any award at this contest, let alone grand champion, was huge for Mary and her crew. “It was crazy. Being behind the scenes and the judging of that, it has been amazing,” said Mary. “Man, it’s such a validation for them. They put in so much work, and I’ve seen these kids when they started first day of culinary school and now where they are now. It’s proud for me to be a part of that, and be a part of their story and a part of their journey. I’m just honored that they trust me to work enough with me to be a part of their career.”
Good Dough Kolache Bakery is never short on innovative offering for the kolache loving people of Galveston, but there are a few options in the kolache case that customers just can’t seem to get enough of. “So our number one bestselling kolache has got to be The Lumbee, The Lumberjack,” said Mary. “It is a maple bacon, sage sausage cream cheese kolache. Then it’s drizzled with maple syrup. Sweet and savory and everything, So this one’s sold seven days a week. We have it all the time.”
The open faced kolache’s may resemble the traditional Czech kolaches that first landed in Central Texas, but the creations from Good Dough blow right past tradition into something truly unique and wonderful.“We’re going to do the Okie-Dokie Artichokie,” said Mary. “So, artichoke spinach dip is one of my favorite snacks of all time. When we were trying to come up with our vegetarian options, this one… I mean, it’s just good spinach dip and then it’s in the sweet dough? Stop. It’s so good. It’s like eating soup out of a bowl. It’s kind of that same concept. You get that hardy love all together.”
A trip to Good Dough Kolache Bakery just wouldn’t be complete without trying the championship-winning kolache, the Mr. Mary’s BBQ. “So it is a blend of my husband’s smoked brisket and his house-made barbecue sauce, which we call unnecessary sauce because the brisket’s so good, the sauce is unnecessary,” said Mary. “Then it’s mixed with cheddar cheese in our kolache dough. It’s good brisket on its own, and then the sauce is good on its own and the bread, but then you put them together, magic. Like angels flew down from Heaven on this one.”
It’s always nice to finish up with something sweet, and it’s even better to try out a Good Dough classic while you’re at it. “You might be full, but here we’re going to have Becky, which is our original kolache,” said Mary. “This is the first one we ever created, and it is a pineapple upside down cake kolache. It’s got bruleed pineapples, fresh pineapple chunks and whole cherries. We make our own bourbon caramel, and then it’s mixed in with cream cheese, and that’s the base of most of our sweet kolaches. We call it the good good. It’s a beautiful kolache. That’s what we started with, the first kolache we ever made when we were recipe testing was this one. That’s how the name Good Dough stuck, and this is Becky with the Good Dough. Just kind of a play on Beyonce. So we got all the Becky’s here working and this is the Becky.”
At the Good Dough Kolache Bakery, it is all good, good because Mary’s grandmother inspired her to do her best when it comes to cooking. Keeping that tradition cooking is what keeps the home fires burning at Good Dough. “It was her passion to cook for people and she would say, ‘Love must be shown. Love must be demonstrated and the way our family does that is through food,’” said Mary. “So that’s just how we show our love around here is one little kolache at a time, or a bite to eat. But it’s seeing the smiles on people’s faces and being a part of their everyday lives and their kids come in and enjoy it. That’s what I really love is just getting to see that part.”