John Truchok doesn't dance at his job but he can do the twist.

He quickly rolls a blob of dough into a yard-long strand. Laying the strand on the table, Truchok flips the doughy strand over and under and tucks in the last few inches neatly. This is how a twist bread is born and is hustled off with a batch of others to the brick oven.

Truchok has the twist record at Mancini's Bakery -- six in less than 20 seconds -- all properly formed.

"Anybody can make bread fast -- but you got to make it nice,'' Truchok said.

Tucked close to a residential area in Stowe Township, just outside McKees Rocks near Pittsburgh, Mancini's is gaining a following among bread lovers in western Pennsylvania.

Founded in 1926 by James Mancini, an Italian immigrant, twist bread was his trademark. Joined by brother Ernie after World War II, they operated the bread bakery as a partnership until Jim's retirement in 1971. Ernie's son, Frankie, joined the company in 1971 but was killed in a motorcycle accident in 1977.

Now owned and operated by Mary Mancini Hartner, Frankie's sister and Ernie's daughter, the bakery cooks up 50,000 pounds of flour a week, which creates more than 10,000 loaves a day.

At the core of the bakery is its Old World taste given by its continually heated brick oven. Originally built in 1924, the natural gas-fired oven was eventually lined with refractory brick -- the same type used in crematoriums.

Kept at a constant 400 degrees, the oven's insulation is better than most blast furnaces as it's lined with brick 6 feet thick on all sides and an additional 3 feet of dirt on both the top and bottom.

"There's enough brick in that oven to build a three-story house,'' said Scott Altman, the bakery's general manager. "We turned the oven off for the first time in 20 years last November for 18 hours and the temperature fell only 20 degrees.''

Bakers use a long paddle, called a peel,'' to insert the bread into the 13-foot-deep fiery hot oven.

Using no preservatives or additives, all of Mancini's bread is crusty, which is created by shooting steam on the dough at the outset of baking.

"The secret,'' said Mrs. Mancini, "is to make it crusty on the outside but soft and tender on the inside.''

Flour is Mancini's biggest expense, but second on the pecking order -- lard -- is another factor setting the company apart. Most of the baking industry uses vegetable shortening. But being mindful of health concerns, Mrs. Mancini points out that lard has no saturates and could be called low-fat because their bread has only one gram of fat per one-ounce serving.

While 88 percent of Mancini's business is wholesale, the company operates a tiny retail store within the Stowe Township bakery.

Friday during Lent is the biggest day for the bakery, but the best day year-round for retail sales is Sunday morning. Sales slack off in summer as the weather heats up.

Its biggest customers are restaurants, grocery and convenience stores.

Magnotto's Shop N'Save in Hermitage has been offering the bread with a great response, said store owner Michael Magnotto. The bread reminds local shoppers of the bread made by the former Macedonian Bakery in Farrell.

"People like the crusty outside,'' Magnotto said of the bread. "It's like going back to the old days.''

Crusty bread sales nationwide enjoyed fast-rising growth, from $918 million in 1994 to $1.58 billion in 2000, according to Modern Baking, a trade publication. But sales growth cooled off to $1.68 billion in 2000 and $1.775 billion in 2002. The popular Atkins diet, which eschews anything with flour, is blamed for the dulling demand.

Looking to tap into new taste buds, last year the Mancinis' business branched out into sun-dried tomato and rosemary breads, initially creating a swell of demand for the products. Sales have tapered off.

"People here are pretty conservative -- they don't want to change,'' Mrs. Mancini said of western Pennsylvania tastes. "Pittsburgh is really behind on the variety breads.''

Employing 40 and steadily growing over the years, Mancini's continues to keep its down-home flavor. Management meetings are held around a kitchen table in a cramped second-floor room above the bakery.

Creating dozens of different types of bread, from French, rye to pumpernickel, Mancini's is best known for the twist. Since there's no machine that can create the intricate twist pattern, this is the company's most labor-intensive bread.

Each baker imprints his own subtle touch to the twist.

"I can generally tell you who made a particular loaf,'' Altman said.

That's OK with Truchok, who isn't shy about his skills.

"When you tell people you work at Mancini's it's like you're a celebrity around town,'' Truchok said.

Mancini Bakery: (412) 331-8508

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