Sunday, August 7, 2011

Pleasanton Bakery and The Village

One of the best bakeries I've ever been to is the Pleasanton Brick Oven Bakery.  Their breads are fantastic!  My favorites are the Tomato Parmesan and the Cherry Chocolate, but they only make certain breads on certain days, and we weren't there the Cherry Chocolate day, so I missed out this year!  All of their breads are wonderful.  I haven't had any of their cookies or other sweet treats, but I'm sure they are good too.





                                                        The Pleasanton Bakery

The bakery is located in this place called The Village, or Grand Traverse Commons, which used to be a mental hospital, and the other buildings in the area look like it.  The Pleasanton building used to be a fire department building, and this is the rest of it.





It looks a lot less creepy in these photos because it was sunny when I took them, and because I don't have a picture of the front of the building, which is the creepiest looking part.  The hospital has been redone and now has shops and restaurants on the bottom floors, but on the top floors they're putting in apartments and offices. 

I find this redo of an old mental hospital strange and creepy because mental hospitals were not fun places to be.  The patients were usually mistreated and punished for behavior that was beyond their control, and they often lived in very bad conditions.  It just makes me a little on edge to be in the building and know how miserable the poor patients must have been.

But luckily the Pleasanton bakery isn't located inside the old hospital, so I have no problem going there to pick up fresh bread! 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Small independant bakeries are sometimes hard to find but they are usually very good.

There is one I keep on coming to in Ottawa (well, more than one really). However, I buy mostly cakes, not bread because it's not exactly on my way home.

au soleil levant said...

Agreed, I think small independent bakeries are great. They have really interesting baked goods. And I don't think there's any problem only buying cakes!

EconomicDisconnect said...

Taking really great pictures! I love fresh bread, still hot.

au soleil levant said...

Thanks, but my pictures are pretty subpar in my opinion! Although in these pictures that's more because of limited mobility and inability to get closer to the object. Agreed that fresh, warm bread is a real treat!