La Rancherita Bakery — Restaurant in Santa Ana

Visit 1: I had to wait 20 minutes for "my goods" to get ready. I told them I needed 18 pieces. After 20 minutes, I was told to wait another 30 minutes but I couldn't - had to get back to work. The lady said there were only 8 pieces available and the rest wouldn't be ready until 2pm. This was 11 am. I said I would take the 8 but turned out that they only took cash. I only had $1 on me. I was disappointed. That would have been my NO star review but I decided to give them another try. Visit 2: I had a Spanish speaking friend call and place my order in advance. Line was busy for a while but finally freed up. I showed up and my goodies were well packaged and ready for me. Everything was delicious. The saltenas! Oh my!! Highly recommend them. Tips: make sure you have cash, place your order in advance if you need more than just a few pieces of anything, don't come here for the ambiance. No star for my 1st visit. 3 stars for my 2nd visit. 5 stars for taste. Will update to 4 stars when they are no longer a cash...

The only reason I went there was to get some Saltenas. My brother-in-law is from Bolivia and I had them for the first time when he made some. But now he's gone, so I missed them. My friend from work told me about this place. The first thing is that it's CASH ONLY place, so bring cash. Second I didn't see prices, so right there I thought, how much is it going to be. Third thing is that the lady who helped us forgot to include some hot bread yo the order. Didn't discover it until we got home, a 30 minute drive. So make sure to check your order before you leave. Didn't know if she charged us for it or not, because we paid over $60, for the dozen Saltenas, some bread, and a pack of tortillas. Without getting a receipt. So make sure you ask for one. All in all the food was delicious, so try it...

I really enjoyed eating their salteñas(Bolivian meat pies). It's like an empanada but with a juicy stew inside that has meat, potatoes, peas, boiled egg..). The dough that the empanada is made of is my favorite, a bit sweet. Doesn't perfectly match the flavors from the salteñas from Bolivia where I am from, but they are still very tasty 😋. Their "llajua" (Bolivian hot sauce) is tasty, needed to be a bit spicer for my taste.

In the past I have also bought frozen salteñas from them to take them to northern california and my family really enjoyed them. Just place you order ahead of time and buy dry ice.

They also have api(purple corn hot drink) and cheese empanadas on the weekends, which i really enjoyed eating as well as Mexican pastries or pan dulce.

Tip: eat salteñas while...