Mahoroba Japanese Bakery (South Land Park)
food: 4.5/5
experience: n/a it's to go
overall: 4.5/5
Okay so if you're in Sac and in need of a good bakery, and you haven't heard of Mahoroba, you need to get on it now. This is like Porto's-tier baked goods for me. (Porto's is an amazing bakery in LA, review to come.) Everything here is a home run. And I have had just about everything.
Let's start in chronological order from my very first trip. In here we have the hot dog (top right), the blueberry cream cheese pie (middle right), pie custard (bottom right), sweet cream cheese (bottom left), and kobe cream delight (top left).
Now let me tell you about how good these are. If you can't decide between having a hot dog and a pizza, go to Mahoroba and get their hot dog. It's a juicy dog on a bun with cheese and sweet tomato sauce and it's everything delicious. The pie custard is like a cheese horn you get at a typical bakery with sweet cream and a hint of cream cheese, all wrapped in a perfectly flaky, sugary shell. Blueberry cream cheese though. I love blueberry. Sweet (not tart) blueberry jam with a layer of sweet cream cheese wrapped in more flaky pastry goodness. The sweet cream cheese is a nice, simple roll with more sweet bagel spread in the middle. Basically a cheesecake sandwich. And the Kobe cream delight is the same thing basically but the bun is more like a bao than a roll. Personally I like the sweet cream cheese better. But yes, a lot of yummy sweet cream cheese items here.
Second trip is as follows. Anpanman choco (near left). Kashi an pan (near right). Green tea kobe cream delight (far left). Curry pan (far right). And a croissant for good measure (also comes with ham and cheese).
The koshi an pan comes with thin or thick red bean paste (the thick paste is just called an pan). Personally I'm not a huge fan of red bean paste, it just doesn't fit my palate. It's got the texture of apple butter and it's sweet. You can't really taste the beans. It's not as sweet as frosting though. But it's just not my style. Still, it's definitely not bad. They also have a strawberry anko cream which is like a cream puff with red bean paste. The croissant also isn't my favorite croissant ever. I'm partial to La Bou still. Mahoroba's is crispy rather than moist and doughy. But they're not a French bakery after all. The green tea kobe though, this is great. If you like the flavor of matcha mixed with cream (and a little cream cheese possibly?), in a warm bun, get this. And definitely get this if you like green tea ice cream. The choco anpanman as you may have guessed is a bun filled with chocolate. It's not a rich chocolate, more like a custard chocolate. Which is also good. Plus it's got a cute lil monkey face. And the curry pan has crisp curry flakes on top with that always-tasty thick Japanese curry filling inside. Makes for a nice little lunch or afternoon snack.
Keepin' em coming. This go-around I walked away with the following goodies. Cream puff (left), double chocolate (middle), chocolate hat (right) which is a.k.a. a "sunrise" with chocolate on top (also comes with green tea on top), cream cheese danish (top), and cinnamon cream danish (top) which is the same as cream cheese but with cinnamon and no almonds.
The cream puff is a nice, light dessert. It's got whipped cream in it as well as custard and it's very fluffy. The danishes are pretty much flat croissants with filling. The cinnamon cream has cinnamon sugar all over the pastry so I personally prefer it over the plain cream cheese almond. Double chocolate has a chocolate shell on the outside and chocolate custard on the inside. It's all chocolate and it's all good. The chocolate hat is interesting. The Sunrise has this topping on it that resembles Mexican conchas, like a sugar cookie sorta. It's a fluffy bun and it's covered with chocolate again. This is my favorite out of this box.
Last trip consisted of the following: blueberry ball (middle), hazelnut choco cream & peanuts (top), orange and cream (right), and white choco & cream (left).
White choco & cream is a basic bao with a white chocolate shell plus an eggy white chocolate-flavored custard inside. Simple and yummy. Blueberry ball, this was probably the best sweet item I've had here. The inside tastes like blueberry ice cream in custard form. The orange and cream is like a cross between a cinnamon roll and a danish, except instead of cinnamon roll filling it tastes like creamsicles. Plus it's got juicy real mandarin slices inside. It's definitely up there with the best of them. And the hazelnut choco cream with peanuts is basically like eating a doughnut. I love doughnuts and this is the closest they got. It's got a chocolate shell and peanuts on the outside, and a Nutella-like cream filling with chopped peanuts on the inside. Very satisfying. Okay so actually this is like the best box I got here. Everything in it is unquestionably, indubitably delicious.
Mahoroba serves some bread items, namely their Shoku pan and their dinner rolls. Dinner rolls looked kinda basic so I went for the loaves. They have thick cut and thin but I like stuff thick so that's what I got. Brick toast basically.
Pretty damn good for white bread. It tastes kinda like brioche, kinda like sweet bread. The biggest appeal of it is obviously its size. It's pretty much like Japanese Texas toast. Good for making French toast with. Too bad they only give you five whole slices. They used to have raisin bread too but they discontinued it. Damn.
Mahoroba also has fish and chicken meatball sandwiches. I already know they're delicious because 1) everything here is and 2) they sell out quick, but they already had barbecue sauce on them and I'm major allergic to soy.
What I like about Mahoroba is they never seem to sell out of the good stuff. Yes, that's because mostly they only sell good stuff. I've never had a legitimately bad thing here. Stuff that's just okay, yes. But I would honestly eat everything I've tried here, again. It's pretty damn inexpensive and there's really no other place like it in Sac.
experience: n/a it's to go
overall: 4.5/5
Okay so if you're in Sac and in need of a good bakery, and you haven't heard of Mahoroba, you need to get on it now. This is like Porto's-tier baked goods for me. (Porto's is an amazing bakery in LA, review to come.) Everything here is a home run. And I have had just about everything.
Let's start in chronological order from my very first trip. In here we have the hot dog (top right), the blueberry cream cheese pie (middle right), pie custard (bottom right), sweet cream cheese (bottom left), and kobe cream delight (top left).
Now let me tell you about how good these are. If you can't decide between having a hot dog and a pizza, go to Mahoroba and get their hot dog. It's a juicy dog on a bun with cheese and sweet tomato sauce and it's everything delicious. The pie custard is like a cheese horn you get at a typical bakery with sweet cream and a hint of cream cheese, all wrapped in a perfectly flaky, sugary shell. Blueberry cream cheese though. I love blueberry. Sweet (not tart) blueberry jam with a layer of sweet cream cheese wrapped in more flaky pastry goodness. The sweet cream cheese is a nice, simple roll with more sweet bagel spread in the middle. Basically a cheesecake sandwich. And the Kobe cream delight is the same thing basically but the bun is more like a bao than a roll. Personally I like the sweet cream cheese better. But yes, a lot of yummy sweet cream cheese items here.
Second trip is as follows. Anpanman choco (near left). Kashi an pan (near right). Green tea kobe cream delight (far left). Curry pan (far right). And a croissant for good measure (also comes with ham and cheese).
The koshi an pan comes with thin or thick red bean paste (the thick paste is just called an pan). Personally I'm not a huge fan of red bean paste, it just doesn't fit my palate. It's got the texture of apple butter and it's sweet. You can't really taste the beans. It's not as sweet as frosting though. But it's just not my style. Still, it's definitely not bad. They also have a strawberry anko cream which is like a cream puff with red bean paste. The croissant also isn't my favorite croissant ever. I'm partial to La Bou still. Mahoroba's is crispy rather than moist and doughy. But they're not a French bakery after all. The green tea kobe though, this is great. If you like the flavor of matcha mixed with cream (and a little cream cheese possibly?), in a warm bun, get this. And definitely get this if you like green tea ice cream. The choco anpanman as you may have guessed is a bun filled with chocolate. It's not a rich chocolate, more like a custard chocolate. Which is also good. Plus it's got a cute lil monkey face. And the curry pan has crisp curry flakes on top with that always-tasty thick Japanese curry filling inside. Makes for a nice little lunch or afternoon snack.
Keepin' em coming. This go-around I walked away with the following goodies. Cream puff (left), double chocolate (middle), chocolate hat (right) which is a.k.a. a "sunrise" with chocolate on top (also comes with green tea on top), cream cheese danish (top), and cinnamon cream danish (top) which is the same as cream cheese but with cinnamon and no almonds.
The cream puff is a nice, light dessert. It's got whipped cream in it as well as custard and it's very fluffy. The danishes are pretty much flat croissants with filling. The cinnamon cream has cinnamon sugar all over the pastry so I personally prefer it over the plain cream cheese almond. Double chocolate has a chocolate shell on the outside and chocolate custard on the inside. It's all chocolate and it's all good. The chocolate hat is interesting. The Sunrise has this topping on it that resembles Mexican conchas, like a sugar cookie sorta. It's a fluffy bun and it's covered with chocolate again. This is my favorite out of this box.
Last trip consisted of the following: blueberry ball (middle), hazelnut choco cream & peanuts (top), orange and cream (right), and white choco & cream (left).
White choco & cream is a basic bao with a white chocolate shell plus an eggy white chocolate-flavored custard inside. Simple and yummy. Blueberry ball, this was probably the best sweet item I've had here. The inside tastes like blueberry ice cream in custard form. The orange and cream is like a cross between a cinnamon roll and a danish, except instead of cinnamon roll filling it tastes like creamsicles. Plus it's got juicy real mandarin slices inside. It's definitely up there with the best of them. And the hazelnut choco cream with peanuts is basically like eating a doughnut. I love doughnuts and this is the closest they got. It's got a chocolate shell and peanuts on the outside, and a Nutella-like cream filling with chopped peanuts on the inside. Very satisfying. Okay so actually this is like the best box I got here. Everything in it is unquestionably, indubitably delicious.
Mahoroba serves some bread items, namely their Shoku pan and their dinner rolls. Dinner rolls looked kinda basic so I went for the loaves. They have thick cut and thin but I like stuff thick so that's what I got. Brick toast basically.
Pretty damn good for white bread. It tastes kinda like brioche, kinda like sweet bread. The biggest appeal of it is obviously its size. It's pretty much like Japanese Texas toast. Good for making French toast with. Too bad they only give you five whole slices. They used to have raisin bread too but they discontinued it. Damn.
Mahoroba also has fish and chicken meatball sandwiches. I already know they're delicious because 1) everything here is and 2) they sell out quick, but they already had barbecue sauce on them and I'm major allergic to soy.
What I like about Mahoroba is they never seem to sell out of the good stuff. Yes, that's because mostly they only sell good stuff. I've never had a legitimately bad thing here. Stuff that's just okay, yes. But I would honestly eat everything I've tried here, again. It's pretty damn inexpensive and there's really no other place like it in Sac.
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