at places that aren't quite traditional bakeries. The first is a fairly new place in East CV...
called Los Pollos (my first visits linked at the end) which not only sells Cuban style pastries but Cuban (and Mexican food) and rotisserie chicken, which I still have yet to try.
Mango pastries in the back and cheese in the front. Not quite Porto's quality but still pretty good!
I also bought a cream cheese muffin, which we really liked. It was so moist (ugh, that word) and had nice bits of the cream cheese in the middle. Sorry, no cross section.
A few times last month I had to do a computer training on the west side of town. Since I was in the area...I stopped by Hogetsu for some mochi snacks. I've never bought anything other than mochi here. During this particular visit, there was a couple making their decisions so while they were picking their mochis and talking to Mrs. Takeda. It turns out that they were from out of town and were "stocking up". They ended up buying three FULL boxes. One of them was for their daughter.
I killed time by looking at their snacks. I ended up buying these two. They were both pretty cheap, $1.49 and $1.79 (seaweed and honey snack and a sweet potato snack). Both looked pretty good but unfortunately, as I found out later that week, both packages were stale. No bueno.
I came out with just three that day, one strawberry square for TC, a steamed manju with red bean and another one with white bean and chestnut inside. I did NOT like the coating because it had a SHIT load of cinnamon. I didn't realize that until I opened it up. The scent was that strong.
The steamed cakes are not really my thing but for the sake of research, am willing to give it a try. Usually, Bert eats the rejects since he's not as picky as I am.
Another training the following week brought me here again. I picked up this box of assorted sweets for my hairstylist, who is Mexican. She's never had these before so I thought it would be fun for her to try Japanese desserts.
Top (from L-R): white bean filled, green tea with red bean, chestnut.
Bottom (from L-R): cinnamon with white bean, coconut, red bean filled
Verdict - she loved each and every piece!
For us, I got these three:
Coconut and strawberry squares for TC and one I hadn't tried yet (the wrapped one), which Mrs. Takeda said was almond. It didn't really look like an almond; in fact, it was a walnut half on top of the mini steamed bun. The filling was white bean with chestnut which I really enjoyed.
The variety of desserts is always different every time I visit and of course, a visit is not complete without a fascinating conversation with Mrs. Takeda.
Another place I went to for some baked goods of the savory type was Papa Luna's. TC and I were in PB for thrift shopping and I wanted to use this coupon.
I made sure to ask for these to be fried, otherwise, they are served baked. Trust me, it tastes better fried. The Carne Molina was meat filled (ground beef, peas, potatoes, olives) and the other, El Chocola was vegetarian for TC (corn, cheese, peppers).
Both empanadas were delicious, especially when slathered with their house made chimichurri.
The guy working here was super nice as well.
The place is more of what you would call a traditional bakery since they offer a multitude of baked goods, most sweet and a few savory. I've posted on 85c many times before. Some of this tray was for my parents (the green tea and red bean roll, one of the squid ink rolls, the taro bread and the one with green onions).
For us, the tuna pastry. I've seen it so many times before but never tried it and man, I would definitely get this again. The top was fo crisp and flaky and had a nice faint nutty flavor from the sesame seeds. The tuna had lot of onions and in it and had a bit of creaminess to it. Not bad at all! Too bad they did not have their hot dog breads available during the time of our visit.
TC chose this bun which was filled with cream. It was flower shaped and we just picked off a couple of the "petals".
This was a 'milk butter puff pastry', but wasn't realy flaky at all, just the top part. The filling was cream filled as well. It was okay.
These buns were or my parents. I think this had a filling, but I don't remember what it was. The one below had green onions. My dad really liked that one.
This was a chocolate bun filled with cream and chocolate. Loved this! It was so soft and the filling was quite plentiful!
I hadn't seen this in previous visits. I'm glad I tried it out along with that tuna pastry!
Previous visit to Los Pollos:
December 2015
Previous visit to Hogetsu:
January 2016
Previous visit to Papa Luna's
June 2015
Previous visit to 85C:
June 2015
While enjoying tried and true favorites is always a safe choice, it's also fun to try new things once in a while!
2 comments:
Nice collection CC! Also nice to know the Takeda's are doing well. I've seen Mr Takeda a couple of time at Nijiya...he always waves at me and gives me a smal.
Thanks Kirk! The Takedas seem to still be going strong thank goodness. The last time I spoke with Mr. Takeda was last year when he told me the story of how his father used to live in the Philippines but left before WWII and then came back afterwards. All this, from asking him about the coconut flavored mochi square.
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