Estrella Bakery

Let me give you the three reasons I went into Estrella Bakery this past Saturday morning:
1) There’s a simple sign above the shop that reads «BAKERY.»
2) My 3 year old just got a haircut and sat still the entire time.
3) It was open.
So, it doesn’t take much, folks. That being said, Estrella may not be much to look at from the outside, but when you make your way inside, the plexiglass cases and metal racks are filled to the brim with all sorts of cookies, pastries and breads. Nothing is marked — as in you really don’t know exactly what you’re purchasing or how much it will cost. The folks who were working here when I visited also didn’t seem to speak much English, so be prepared to read the register and cobble together a bit of espanol if you can. I asked the woman running back and forth from the back room to the register for a bag to snag some cookies and 2 minutes later I walked out with seven cookies for $ 2.92. Fine by me!
The cookies were fresh and tasty just as cookies should be. They weren’t anything out of this world, but in terms of value, Estrella is pretty great. Next time (post haircut) I want to grab a croissant or two.

There is nothing better than fresh bakery goods Witt my coffee in the morning. Get the croissant and a marble load. More traditional mexican pastries are also some of the best that I have had outside of Mexico. Support this local business so that it stays around. The owner works his tail off and it shows. I almost want to encourage him to raise his prices.

I come here with my wife regularly. We generally just pick up their giant croissants that my wife loves. Things aren’t openly priced, but everything is inexpensive and fresh. Everything I’ve tried here has been excellent. I’ve never gotten a birthday cake or anything like that here, so I can’t comment on that.

Mexican bakeries.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The BEST kind of bakeries (okay, Asian bakeries too. Duh.)
However, not all Mexican bakeries are created equal.
This was my first time at Estrella Bakery, as I’d only stumbled upon it while on my way to to dinner at a place just down the strip mall from here. The windows were almost totally blocked with shades, making it hard to tell if they were open or not.
There weren’t any hours posted, but there was a sign in the window that said, «Abierto,» which I had to be told means ‘open’ because I took French and German in jr high and high school, because, ya know, those come in handy so often in my everyday life.
So we went in.
And it was glorious! As it is every time I’m in a Mexican bakery. What to choose, what to choose… The selection here definitely looked a bit beat up and they didn’t have the same selection as a lot of other bakeries I’ve come to frequent. It was, however, a Sunday over a holiday weekend and nearing into the the evening, so I can’t fault the goods for not being at their freshest.
We ended up getting 4 different pastries. A big sweet bread loaf with a criss-​cross design on it, a bun filled with sweet potato (which was really good, but it was basically a hot pocket stuffed with baby food, which I can be okay with), the crumble cake with a little chocolate bit on top, and this rectangular bread that looked like it’d be stuffed with some kind of filling, but was just more sweet bread.
I was a bit disappointed in the lack of variety (where were all the cheese pastries!?) but also a little taken aback with the number of little gnats I saw flying around. I know it’s summer, but that’s not something you want to see. Pulling the sliding plastic doors to see a gnat come off the exact pastry I was looking to grab with handy tongs is undoubtedly once of the saddest feelings ever… not one that held me back from still buying and eating that pastry, but still, it dampened the mood.
I thought the pastries we’d gotten were all okay. The sweet potato/​Hot Pocket/​Baby food bun was by far the best, the rest were a little too dry, but I’d for sure come back on a regular non-​holiday day to try again… plus, they were pretty darn cheap.
Also, on our visit, the woman working the counter did not speak a lick of English, so if you appear to not be fluent in Spanish, don’t be surprised if she politely points to the register with your total instead of saying it aloud.