Tobara Bakery

Great little bakery for little Mexican pastries and desserts. I almost exclusively come for the delicious and super fresh bionicos. Bionicos is a Mexican fruit salad. It’s like a large parfait with sliced apples, papaya, strawberries, bananas, honeydew melon, and cantaloupe topped with a to die for cream or crema made of sour cream and condensed milk. Their crema is the real deal not store bought yogurt that some places use. Granola, shredded coconut and raisins complete the topping. I love the raisin texture with the cream. Leave out the granola to make it gluten free. They have two sizes one personal size (think a togo container) for $ 4 and a large size for $ 9 similar in shape to a styrofoam togo container for a large Chinese entrée. This place is a hidden bionicos gem. Try their many shakes and juices too.

I’ve bought items at this bakery on a couple of occasions. The coffee was good and the baked goods were fine, but this is East L.A. and as far as the Mexican pan dulce goes, Tobara has some stiff competition from nearby bakeries. What’s cool is that Tobara also offers other idiosyncratic Mexican specialties like tostilocos and bionicos (if you don’t know what these are, you have to roll up your sleeves and give them a try to really understand what these «antojitos» are about… they will sound odd if I simply describe them).
This little coffee shop/​bakery doesn’t have free wifi (unless it’s changed since I’ve been there). It’s conveniently located at the corner of Whittier Blvd. and Arizona Avenue in East Los (next to Andy’s Adult XXX bookstore… ha!).
In my opinion, we need more places like this in East L.A. (like the bakery… NOT the XXX shop… unless, of course, that’s your preference :)