Weekly visits to panaderia remind me of grandpa

Abraham Villarreal
3 min readApr 25, 2022

When I go to the panaderia (bakery) on Thursday evenings to get my pan dulce (Mexican sweet bread), I think about my maternal grandfather who once owned and operated a panaderia in Agua Prieta. It was called Letty’s, named after my mother.

I never went to it and never have seen it in pictures. I wish I did, and I do think about it when I go into La Mejor, each Thursday evening. It’s my favorite panaderia in Agua Prieta. Small, and quaint looking. It’s on a little block right off the main entrance from the port of entry.

There isn’t much left on the block. The rest of the buildings are abandoned, discolored, and somewhat falling apart. In between them, La Mejor stands out because of its nicely painted business name, right on the wall, over the door and window.

That’s about all you see. In the United States, we have high expectations for our dining and food establishments. They should be spotless. The windows, crystal clean. The floors washed, the cashier a machine to run our cards through before we write our names with an index finger.

That’s not La Mejor. What it has going for it is a consistent offering of the best variety of pan dulce. The kind with different colored glazes, shapes that are long and narrow, circles with fillings, empanadas (turnovers), and one of my favorites —…

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Abraham Villarreal

People are interesting. I write about them and what makes them interesting.