Prep your palate for all those Easter sweets by nibbling on a hot cross bun from St. Lawrence Bakery in Price Hill (3715 St. Lawrence Ave.; 921-3331). But don't wait too long. Like most bakeries, St. Lawrence stops selling the yeasty buns on Good Friday.

        Unlike most bakeries, owners Bill and Paul Hartmann at St. Lawrence still fold a little diced candied fruit into the batter, which gives the buns only a hint of citrus flavor (not sticky like fruit cake). The bakers slather the top of the buns with white icing and then paint on the namesake pink cross.

        The pre-Easter hot cross bun tradition may go back for centuries. Bill Hartmann Sr., who has retired from St. Lawrence, remembers his father, Conrad, making the little buns when the family bakery was on Western Avenue, before the move to Price Hill in 1949. His father used to decorate the buns with a “cross” of red jelly.

        Pink icing tastes fine, too. And the buns are only 50 cents each.

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