Golden Gate Bakery's Egg Custards

(Happy New Year)

Happy 2005. Yeap. We can all do worse than starting the new year with a poster of the prosperity deity from Chinatown.

There is much online buzz on Golden Gate Bakery from Chowhound and eGullet. A quick survey of Chinese friends also confirm its status as a well known local institution. Amongst its offerings, the egg custard tarts constantly come up as a prized item. With Ritz Carlton San Francisco being, literally, five minutes upnhill from the shop by foot, egg custards await.

It is a sparse shop with shelves full of traditional Chinese pastries, one calendar adorning the whitewashed wall and stacked boxes and chairs crowding the space for waiting customers. There is a long line where the faces are mostly Asian and the audible conversations mostly non-English.




A few background notes on egg custards. They are most commonly seen as one of the dessert options on a dim-sum cart. It is composed of a flaky crust, traditionally, made with lard and filling made of egg yolk, sugar, and milk or cream. If the dough is kept cold and handled minimally, the crust would be light and flaky and the pastry chef shows his individuality via the ingredients and seasoning.

Two still-hot custards are purchased. The crust is flaky but slightly chewy - not sure if lard-substitute is used, been over-handled, or it is due to the humidity of a raining day. The filling is hot and slightly running in texture with a strong bouquet of egg.

On a relative scale, the egg custards are definitely better than most of the egg custards I have found in dim-sum outfits. There are worse things to do in San Francisco Chinatown.




Golden Gate Bakery
1029 Grant Ave
San Francisco, CA 94133
T: 415-781-2627


(C)2005 GlobalCorners About