By Brett Callwood
Located in the Pacific Square Shopping Center, one of Gardena’s genuine jewels, there’s much to love about the Sunmerry Bakery Cafe before you’ve even set foot inside the place. Pacific Square is a browser’s and diner’s paradise. There are all manner of Asian stores and restaurants – lovers of everything from anime and manga to K-pop and J-pop can find plenty of delights. And the food covers Japanese, Thai and Chinese. You can spend hours there, shopping and dining.
But when you want dessert, a snack or just a drink, you can’t do better than Sunmerry. A mini-chain with just 12 locations in the United States (ten in California, the other two in New Jersey), the place is brimming with tempting baked goods.
“Sunmerry started in Japan and was brought to Taiwan in 1986,” reads their online biography. “With the Japanese baking techniques, and the local Taiwan flavors, Sunmerry Bakery has become a household name in Taipei. Being a family company, the growth we make [is measured] by our products and our customers and not the number of stores or sales. We take pride in our baking expertise and our ability to come up with new products that match the local flavors, and these are what we hope to bring to the US market.”
The first thing you notice when you do enter is that Sunmerry doesn’t look like your regular American/European bakery. Everything is immaculate, all of the items are individually wrapped – it almost looks like the food has been repackaged, but fear not.
In fact, everything tastes wonderfully fresh, and super-light. It’s actually tough to decide what to eat – everything looks good. We went with one savory and one sweet item, for balance. We started with the Ham & Egg pastry, which is exactly what it sounds like it is. Light, bouncy bread with sliced, baked ham rounds of hard boiled egg and drizzled cheese. For a brunch item like this, it doesn’t feel heavy and the flavors combine with the slightly sweet bread beautifully.
However, we would suggest that the stars at Sunmerry are the sweets. We opted for the Custard Danish, which is actually more like a croissant. The flaky pastry and thick, rich custard are a decadent treat, and the combo of powdered and crystalized sugar only add to that vibe.
We also had a Lemon Cooler drink – a wonderfully refreshing beverage for an L.A. summer day. But then, everything at Sunmerry works.
Sunmerry Bakery Cafe is located at 1630 W. Redondo Beach Blvd., Gardena 90247. Call 424-329-0542 or visit sunmerryus.com.
