Secrets Of The Costco Bakery You'll Wish You Knew Sooner

Costco is a magnet for bulk-buying deal-hunters, with specials on everything from gasoline to kayaks to toilet paper. If you have the room to store (what seems like) 98 rolls of paper towels and 20-pound bags of frozen burritos (these might be slight exaggerations), your Costco annual membership can help you save a lot of money. 

That said, some people argue that warehouse store memberships, like a Costco membership, are only good for saving money on items with long shelf-lives. If you subscribe to this line of thinking, though, you're actually overlooking some pretty killer deals in the bakery aisles at Costco. Sure, you may know a few Costco hacks already — like how they're a go-to for giant pumpkin pies — but Costco's bakery offers everything from tiramisu to bagels to sheet cakes. And even if you don't think you can eat 25 fresh croissants before they get stale, there are Costco bakery secrets that can help you make the most of your membership when it comes to feeding a crowd — regardless of a short shelf-life.

Costco's bakery isn't just known for selling baked goods in bulk — they sell huge, oversized baked goods in bulk. Take for instance their pumpkin pie, which weighs in at almost four pounds and can easily feed 12 adults — it's huge. But it's not the only huge product in-store — their muffins are also gigantic (and delicious), but when they come in a pack of 12, it's understandably hard to eat them all before they start to go stale. That's the exact problem pointed out on Rather-Be-Shopping.com, when the author lamented their kids' inability to power through the whole package before having the muffins go stale. 

The author's solution? The freezer, which apparently works wonders. Just place your Costco muffins in a freezer-safe bag and pull them out when you're ready for them. You can defrost the muffins on your counter or in your fridge, but as the author points out, you can also put them in the microwave at 50-percent power for a fast and even defrosting (and a slightly warm muffin). 

And if you're feeding muffins to your kids? These things are huge, so you really, one muffin can easily serve two small humans. Just slice it in half and serve. By saving the rest in your freezer, you won't have to stress about food waste. 

There are simple cake recipes out there, but let's just be honest — homemade cakes might come with an extra dash of love mixed in, but they're kind of a hassle to make. And that's just for basic cakes you can whip up from a box and top with standard icing. It's a whole different beast to try to bake a specialty cake, like a tiramisu, from the comfort of your home. 

Tiramisu is made from soaking Italian ladyfinger cookies (which you have to either bake first or search for in a store) in espresso or liquor before layering them with mascarpone or custard and adding a layer of cocoa powder. You then have to allow the whole thing to chill for hours before serving. Is such a long process really worth the reward of calling it homemade? 

The correct answer is "probably not." This is why it's so amazing that Costco has a giant, 2.38-pound tiramisu cake available to purchase in the refrigerated section of the bakery. Not only do you not have to take the hours of time necessary to prepare a cake yourself, but you'll probably end up saving money, too. As pointed out on Rather-Be-Shopping.com, the individual ingredients for making tiramisu can be expensive, and with the Costco-version costing roughly $16 for a giant cake? It's one heck of a good deal. 

Typically when you think of Costco bakery items, you probably think about the fresh baked goods laid out on big tables and racks near the refrigerated section where the cakes are kept. But Costco also sells many of its baked goods as frozen foods in the freezer aisles, and they're often a better deal. 

In a Reddit thread asking Costco employees about the best deals they know of, one Reddit user pointed out that you can buy 24 cookies in the fresh section of the bakery for $7.99, but if you ask for a box of frozen cookies, you'll score 180 for $34.99. If you bother to do the math on that, fresh cookies come out to about $.33 each, while the frozen version is more like $.19 each. Granted, most people don't need to buy 180 cookies, but if you have the freezer space or a big event to plan for, the frozen version is a much better deal. And according to the Reddit user, the same types of savings apply to other frozen baked goods, like bread and bagels. 

Yes, Costco is a warehouse store, and yes, its bakery churns out countless loaves of breads, cookies, cakes, and other baked goods each day, but just because you can theoretically show up and buy hundreds of bagels and croissants the morning of your next big event, doesn't mean you should. And the beauty of Costco's dedicated bakery department is that it's easy to place an advance order — just walk up to the counter and let the staff know what you need, how much you need, and when you need it. 

There are two important reasons for placing an advance order when you know you need a large number of baked goods: First, it's the only way to guarantee Costco will have exactly what you need on hand. And second, as an article in Reader's Digest points out, it ensures that other customers can buy what they need, too. When a single person waltzes in and buys out every single cookie the store has on-hand, that kind of ruins the experience for everyone. Protect your own needs, and the needs of others, by giving the bakery department a head's up. It's a courtesy to everyone, but it ultimately makes your life easier, too. 

You probably know you can waltz into Costco and grab one of their sheet cakes straight from the refrigerated section without having to order ahead. It's great for last-minute parties or events where you don't need any sort of personalization. But what if you're planning a themed birthday and you want an affordable and personalized cake? All you need to do is place your Costco cake order in advance. Like most grocery store bakeries, Costco has lots of designs to choose from, and they can add the specializations you want to the top of your cake.  

One idea you might not think of is to do as blogger Little Dove shares on her website. When this mom plans a party for her kids, she does the bulk of the cake decorating herself, but she relies on ordering a Costco cake "pre-scored" with frosted piping. The bakers end up piping even, perfect squares across the cake in white frosting. This allows her to then individually decorate each square at home. When party-time hits, she can also use the pre-scored lines to slice the cake evenly. 

When placing her order, she checks the box for "scored flowers," then crosses out the word "flowers." She then places "N/A" next to the option for colors, and writes, "Just scored, no flowers." The result is a perfectly scored white frosted cake. The best part? It's a whole lot cheaper than buying a personalized cake from other bakeries. 

The Costco website isn't just a place to search for great deals — it's actually a place to find great recipes, too. While not all the recipes incorporate items from the store's bakery department, a surprising number do. Take, for instance, the Kirkland Signature Summertime Recipes page which details how to turn a sheet cake into individual cake stars and how to make dessert kabobs using churros. 

The website also features a number of breakfast and lunch recipes that use their croissants, bagels, and various buns as starters. For instance, there's the Father's Day Breakfast Sandwich recipe that uses a bagel topped with sausage, egg, and cheese, before using sriracha sauce to draw stitching to look like a baseball, or the Kirkland Signature Meatball Sub Sandwich which uses almost all Costco products to build the perfect, dinner-worthy sandwich. The website offers lots of easy and creative recipes, so add the site to your favorites page and start searching for ideas before your next shopping trip.