I guess I never noticed the store before but something caught my eye as I sped past, then I recognized the name of the place...
was the same as another market of the same name (they are related) in nearby Chula Vista.
I really like these neighborhood banners that seem to be everywhere. This one was in the holiday spirit, proclaiming "Felices Fiestas".
I doublebacked on that street and came across La Bodega, which happened to be the wholesale store.
It was quite spacious inside and out...
I wasn't sure what to expect as I hadn't gone to their other markets (one in Chula Vista and the other also in San Ysidro)...
It was a big warehouse inside with many Mexican products. Canned goods, sauces, snacks...
candy that was dirt cheap...
including many that had chili powder of fruit like this...(they also had spicy dried tamarind)
In the back were party supplies and staples like rice, flour, and beans.
Aaaand if you're a baker, HOLY COW, you would LOVe this place! In this aisle were tubs and tubs full of colored crystal sugars (in every color), colored pearls, and confetti sprinkles. Only $3.99 per tub. On the other side of this aisle were cake decorating supplies, like stands, pillars, and tiered displays, as well as cake pans of every size, pastry bags, tips, cupcake liners (in all colors, patterns and commercial characters) and more...
The prices were very reasonable and I noticed Wilton (a respected cake decor supplier) as one of the brands.
At the end of one of the aisles were several shelves that held all the stuff you needed to make tostilocos, like chaca chaca (made out of hawthorn pulp)...
At the top were coated Japanese peanuts (plain and spicy varieties)...
followed by bags of shaped chips, bottles of chamoy, and big jars of cueritos (pickled pig skin). Some of those sizes of jars and bottles were mega-sized!
Now on to the candy...this was one of my faves growing up. We would get this for a dime at the ice cream man after school. Inside were little rose-decorated plastic rounds of powdered peanut candy, known as mazapan in Spanish.
This box of spicy tamarind pulp candy was less than $2...
These cups of mango with chili powder were less than $1.50...
These sugared guava roll candies were only $1.70 for a box of 12. What!?
Across the freeway from La Bodega is Lucky supermarket (not the same as the one in Mira Mesa, mind you)...just to give you some bearing on where La Bodega is.
If you go too far south, you'll be heading towards TJ!
The lady who rang me up was super nice. She spoke only Spanish and said to me, "There's no need to go to Tijuana, we have everything over here!", to which I replied (in my crappy Spanish), "Yes, you have really good prices here!"...She asked me if I had been to the Chula Vista store but I told her, "Not yet". We wished each other a good day and I also wished her "Feliz Navidad".
La Bodega Wholesale (cake, craft & decoration)
388 West Calle Primera
San Ysidro, CA 92173
(619) 662-3032
www.labodegamarket.com
I'll have to check out the La Bodega on Broadway in Chula Vista. They have a panaderia in there. One of our secretaries orders her flaky empanadas from that location so once all this holiday madness dies down, I'll be making a trip down there to sample an empanada or two...
2 comments:
... I want all of those sprinkles! :)
Mary - Man, they had EVERY COLOR there! I wish they had smaller sized containers though. Those were pretty damn large. If you buy one, you have to either be making a lot of something in that color, I suppose.
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