Filipino Home Baking & Grocery

This is one of my favorite places to go and get Filipino products. Owner is very friendly, and will assist you with any questions you may have. This is my wife’s place to get many of the ointments we use. Before we could only get them at the Chinese markets in DC. Now that there are really no «old» Chinatown stores that sell herbs spices or ointments. I personally go because I love tocino and this is the only place I know to get it.

Environment: if you don’t mind parking in metered spaces then there are plenty of parking otherwise, there are only two designated parking space right in front of the store and those are usually not available. The place is tiny and packed and beware of boxes on the floor!
Selection: for the fact that their name says «bakery», I automatically think of that famous bakery place back home called Julia’s bake shop. This place is not Julia’s, the owner probably thought that if they offer pandesal they can put bakery in their name. Aside from that, they offer items that I normally shop for which is mostly dried goods (instant noodles, chips etc), they also have frozen items (bangus, tocino etc) and occasionally, hipon (shrimp paste).
Staff: my mom and I came here enough to know that the lady (with glasses) is not friendly. She looks like she does not want to be there and somebody took a shit in her coffee that’s why she has a frown.
The only reason why they receive 3 stars because this place is closer to home and offers what I need. The $ 10 minimum does not bother me because if you buy 2 items in the store, it’s guaranteed you hit the minimum. Yeah, that just shows how much expensive this place is.

Sorry my friends, but this Filipino store doesn’t offer much to be joyous about. The only reason I found out about it was because I was looking for a different business to have lunch at and punched in «Filipino» on my iPhone Unilocal app. Pop comes this place on my map and I thought to myself, hey that’s not on my list — so off I went!
The parking is horrible… there are only two tiny spots designated for patrons, otherwise you have to pay for metered parking.
Once inside, wow! Talk about cramming everything into a tiny space! You can barely walk in here without bumping into something or someone (I’m thinking it’s so Filipinos can reminisce about driving in Manila traffic).
Limited offerings and high prices. Despite the name, there is NO fresh bakery products and it’s in a bad location. The store is cramped and dirty inside. If you live within walking distance and need a specific item — maybe go… otherwise keep moving.

Hmmm… for not being original. There is really no baking going on but just ready cooked, frozen food to go. For grocery items, this convenience store will have some of what you need for home cooking. Parking is very limited, 2 spots reserved for the store customers. Better yet, turn around and go somewhere if you find that it is a hassle. And thats sum it all.

For the mere fact that this place exists, I should give them 5 stars.
Being from San Diego and of Filipino heritage, I’m trying to not be too critical of this place considering that Filipinos and Filipino food are just so underrepresented in the DC metro area. It’s like trying to find a damn unicorn or an honest politician, nearly impossible.
Anyway, here’s the low-​down:
The Good:
— The store is located on a oneway back-​alley street, literally right in front of the Wheaton metro kiss & ride parking lot.
–Has pre-​packaged pandesal.
–Instant sinigang, tocino, adobo, and even sisig seasoning packets.
–Prepared dishes such as: chicken bbq on a stick, pancit malabon, tocino, and some others I can’t remember. They also have frozen lumpia, longaniza, and chicken/​pork siopao.
–Filipino mainstays like ligo, shrimp bagoong, and Milo can be found here.
The Bad:
— This place is tiny, probably as big as my apartment.
— It has baking in it’s name and yet all they have to sell for baked goods is pandesal?! Where’s the suman, puto rice cakes, bibingka, cassava cakes, ube cakes, sapin sapin, turon, karioka??? I could go on and on with this…
— No ube ice cream/​desserts or halo-​halo :(
-$ 10 credit card minimum. Not necessarily a bad thing, just something to watch for. I only came in to buy pandesal and forgot my cash, it was really my bad.
The Ugly:
— The chicken on a stick was horrible, which is weird considering all the marinade ingredients listed aren’t normally what you consider offensive in any way (soy sauce, sugar, and garlic), and yet every bite tasted like it was marinated in nail polish remover. It was pretty painful eating this.
— I’m more of a fan of pancit bihon than malabon or canton so I may be a bit biased, I just don’t like palabok seasoning, it was way too fishy tasting. Also, there were no slices of carrots or cabbage (i know to each their own), but I think having them offsets the texture of the noodles.
— $ 5 for just one dish of pancit and another $ 5 for 3 sticks of bbq chicken on a stick?! Maybe I have been spoiled by having grown up in a huge Filipino community where the food was plentiful and a combo order of pancit bihon, sisig, rice, a cup of sinigang na baboy, and two bbq chicken/​pork on stick would cost you around $ 7 – 8. Or maybe I just got ripped off. Either way, I have a bad taste in my mouth.
It makes me shudder just thinking what the other dishes might taste like…