Restaurant Review: La Reyna Bakery
A dad comes out of retirement to help his daughter expand the family business
Reviewed by Kate Thornberry, Fri., Aug. 10, 2007
La Reyna Bakery
1505 E. Seventh, 476-42111816 S. First, 447-1280
Monday-Saturday, 7am-9pm; Sunday, 8am-3pm
For more than 20 years, La Reyna Restaurant and the adjoining La Reyna Bakery on South First delivered a one-two punch of fresh, homemade Mexican food and first-rate Mexican-style baked goods. La Reyna Bakery served as a hub of the neighborhood, with a stream of customers stopping in for fresh flour tortillas, bread, pan dulce, cookies, and pastries. The constant bustle, piped-in Tejano accordion music, and festive aroma of baking always lent La Reyna an oddly pleasing, Christmas-in-July air, complete with red-and-green decor.
Much to the dismay of longtime customers, proprietor Vicente Hernandez sold the bakery half of the business in the Nineties and retired. Or, rather, he tried to; when his daughter Linda Herrera bought a struggling Eastside Mexican restaurant in 2006, Hernandez came out of retirement and began baking his mouthwatering tortillas, breads, and treats again, to give his daughter's new place a boost. Eventually, Herrera adopted the full La Reyna menu, creating a new version of the winning restaurant/bakery combination.
Now both the Eastside La Reyna location and the South First original are carrying the full line of baked goods again. Topping sales are the bestselling Pan de Huevos, small round loaves of lightly sweet egg bread topped with broken swirls of yellow, white, or chocolate icing. My longtime favorites, the light-as-air, pineapple-jam filled Novias come a close second in popularity, followed by the pumpkin, apple, and pineapple-filled empanadas. Myriad other pastries, cookies, and flans fill the display cases, and La Reyna's distinctive "light and fluffy" home-style flour tortillas are available, as well.
