Noe Valley Bakery — Restaurant in San Francisco

Since there’s not too many bakeries here in the Castro area, I find myself going to NVB on 24th Street and the reason being is because the pastries are made fresh and they’re so much to choose from,like the Chardamont knot pastries,butter croissants,blueberry scones and double almond croissants filled a touch of cream from the inside of the croissants and lots of shaved almonds on the top of the croissants,the fanciers tart with peach filling on top. I can go on forever about this wonderful bakery with such array of treats.The staff are friendly and you’re greeted with a nice smile 😊🤗 whenever u go inside the bakery and with such an efficient staff. Most importantly, you have to arrive early and if by chance you arrive later than 1:00 chances are you might have to wait in line to get your pastries or they might not have what you want since they tend to run out of pastries right away.The best time to go is between the hours of 8:00 or 9:00 a.m.. I have been going to this bakery practically every 2-3 weeks or whenever I ran out of pastries. They do have another location and it’s over in the West Portal area location and their next door neighbors are Peet’s Coffee and just right down the block is Star Bucks,just like the other one in Noe Valley where u can bring your pastries and order a Latte,hot chocolate,coffee or tea to go with your delicious pastries. The only “Glitch “ is that there’s no sitting space available since it’s a small bakery and take out is always a must. My overall experience with this bakery has been...

Turtle cheesecake: 1/5, only redeeming factor is the Oreo crust. The chocolate center is made with cloyingly sweet chocolate and the cheesecake is all the calories without any mouthfeel of creamy indulgence.

Brownie: 3/5, nothing to write home about, better after it’s been in the freezer and becomes chewy. I prefer my homemade brownies.

Small fruit tart: 2/5: this was most disappointing of all because there’s so much potential for a good fruit tart. The pastry dough used is rather flavorless without the authentic delicate, buttery profile I love in tart crusts. The crème pâtissière was dull as well. It’s infinitely easy to make good crème pâtissière, what’s the issue here?

Seeded bread loaf: 4/5: this is very good execution. Even if I’m not that into pepitas, I think most people would enjoy this bread.

I’ll probably have to commute back to Thorough Bread and Pastry for real quality tarts. I’ll keep testing NVB, though, and will report back if I find a cake or tart of high quality. You never know! Maybe I made all the...

First things first: I bought a 6” strawberry cake for a birthday (which was INCREDIBLY tasty, so fresh and good! Highly recommend— the buttercream is the perfect sweetness). Glad to support a local bakery as opposed to Whole Foods 😊

The in-store experience was kind of chaotic though. I went on Saturday morning around 9am and there was a long line outside. That’s fine, but while waiting we all had to listen to constant uncomfortable heckling from someone sitting by the door, saying “go in, go in!!!” even though it was very crowded inside. Even when going inside, it was pretty confusing and you’re constantly dodging people left and right who are shuffling around either waiting for part of their paid order or a preorder pickup or something. It felt like the whole order system could benefit with a little more structure to help with the volume of people inside. Staff were doing their best despite the rush!

I also picked up a small fruit tart and morning bun when I was there, but those were kind of a letdown. 4 stars for the...