Carrara Pastries, Moorpak

Carrara Pastries

476 West Los Angeles Street 

Moorpark, CA 93021

(also at 2894 Roadside Dr.

Agoura Hills, CA, 91301)

My love affair with the cream puff began in the 60's. Like many people in the Los Angeles area that grew up between the 1930's and the 1960's, I remember the Helms Bakery truck coming down the street. It was a big deal, and if my Mom was in a good mood, she would stop the truck and have a cream puff. Since (according to Wikipedia) the Helms Bakery went out of business in 1969, my memories stem from when I was five, and so in the mists of time, the cream puff seemed to be the size of my head. My mother would have one, and I always wanted one. I was told that (like onion rings and orange juice-you'll have to ask my mother) cream puffs were 'adult food,' and I instead was allowed a donut. I don't think I ever got to try a Helms Bakery Cream Puff, and because of the way that my mother deprived me, I turned to a life of crime. Okay, not quite, but instead I look for a great cream puff.

To talk about the Helms truck for just a moment-it was yellow and black, and featured very well constructed wooden shelves on which all the baked goods would sit. When I was at UCLA, I had a friend who had a friend that rented part of the wood shop in the Helms Bakery Building in Culver City. After seeing Neil Young (in '84, I think), we went back to the Bakery wood shop, where we all drank way too much and I poked around the woodworking tools that were used to customize the trucks. 

So now, at age 50, I still think of cream puffs (as well as onion rings and orange juice) as 'adult food,' seldom buying them for myself and always fascinated with them when I see them. And what I've discovered is that most cream puffs aren't very good. The pastry has to be light and the cream can't be too sweet. When I occasionally break down and buy one at the market or a bakery, they seem a bit stale. At donut shops cream puffs are twice the cost of donuts and generally not good. 

And yet, I still search, hoping that some day I'll be grown up enough to eat and enjoy a cream puff. And of course, I'm curious as to how big the Helms Bakery cream puffs actually were. According to a few websites, everyone who remembers them says they were huge-but like me, it's hard to say how inflated things get in memory.

And how does that tie into Carrara Pastries? Don't worry, I'm getting there.

At my wedding, back in the 90's, there was a huge wedding cake. I don't remember if it was good or not-it looked nice, though, and I didn't shove cake in my wife's face. We were traditionalists, and at a wedding there is a cake, not cupcakes or pastries.

But I've been to two weddings of young people this year (younger than 33, I mean), and both had only a small wedding cake for cutting. One featured cupcakes, which were pretty good. The other, pastries from Carrara. As luck would have it, I was seated near the pastry table, and upon it, grown up food-cream puffs. When it was time to have them, I was at the table quickly. A sign said, "Please have 2 only," so I quickly zeroed in on the cream puffs on the table. 

Actually, it was a 'cream bigné, and it was delicious. A little larger than bite size, with a flakey pastry crust and cream filling that wasn't too sweet, I helped myself to my two, as well as the one of the two that was due my wife, and several uneaten ones from around the table. I believe there were four other pastries, and I tried them all, each one good, but not as good as the cream puff-oh sorry, bigné.

When the bride had a few minutes, she told me that the good people at Carrara Pastries had driven the pastries from Moorpark to the San Diego Wild Animal Park that morning for her wedding. I think I also  asked her if she had had her two pastries, because if she didn't, I had already ate them.

I made a mental note to try the pastry shop the next time that I was in Moorpark.

So recently, my daughter and I were driving by on our way to something or other, and it was time.

We entered the clean, somewhat futuristic pastry shop, and waited in a short line. There was a large case of pastries on display, along with racks behind the counter of more fresh pastries. Two large video screens would alternate between the menu and shots of various coffee drinks being prepared. And in the case were plenty of cream puffs.

My daughter and I both ordered different pastries, and I had an Americano to go with mine. I enjoyed mine, but as for my daughter, I don't think she enjoyed it as much. A twelve year old palate, I think, isn't ready for a pastry so much as it wants a ball of sugar-like a donut for instance.

And so what I discovered, along with the best cream puff I've come across in the last 30 years, is that maybe my mom was correct, and cream puffs really are grown up food.

Carrara also serves sandwiches, which looked good, salads, gelato, and a wide variety of coffee drinks.

And they also had a really cool bathroom sink.