Howard’s Bakery

i love howard, s bakery there cakes are so awsome ! :)

I did not like it at all! I bought like 5 different things & they were all dry & not tasty.

HOWARD’S BAKERY HAS CLOSED ITS DOORS!
I guess that’s what happens when you do business in a low-​rent district, charge outrageous prices, and put out lousy food. Up until about the late 1980s, Howard’s was great. The première bakery in East County. But then something happened. Bad management. Surly service. Inept pastry chefs. Special requests were tolerated less and less. And now, it’s gone. Howard’s used to be the place to go. Today, sadly, it will not be missed. RIP, Howard’s of yesteryear.

Ordered zebra striped cupcakes to take to school for my daughters birthday. I picked them up on the way to school and I almost fell over when I saw them. They looked horrible! There were no zebra stripes they looked like thick black gummy worms. People I showed them to laughed and asked if I actually paid for them. I won’t be back. Beware of ordering something outside of their samples.

My significant other and I pigged out on sinful goodies and coffee today and we both had a sugar & caffeine rush. I almost felt like passing out from it. Their coffee was pretty darn good and the price was right at $ 1.50 with free refills. Everything was delicious (except one item). The pastry that I exchanged was as hard as a rock, but I’m sure going so late in the day was the reason for this. The cashier just swiped it out for a cheese danish and it was gooey and decadent.
My significant other loved his chocolate éclair and his cream horn. The girl at the counter took good care of us today and she was really nice. A good time was had by all! And we walked part of our caffeine rush off while going home.

I don’t know how to start here… wanted to pick up some goodies for the office, came across Howard’s Bakery and decided to give them a try.
They are very inexpensive, and I know people say «you get what you pay for», but this was a bit ridiculous. Ordered some cupcakes, they were placed in a box way to big, so by the time they were in the car, they had shuffled around, frosting everywhere, and I was missing 1! Got some donuts as well, some were very good and fresh (sugar donut), while others had an odd texture (maple bar).
Sorry, don’t think I’ll be back, I think any grocery store bakery has WAY better sweets for around the same price.

So this review is ONLY for their customer service. I did not try any of their baked goods.
I recently stopped in to look for a birthday cake to feed about 14 people and I needed it asap. I didn’t pre-​order anywhere, but figured I might find something in here. We celebrate birthdays at my workplace and somehow I’m always stuck with the task of buying the cake. Maybe it’s because I have high standards and have gone out of my way to Heaven Sent, Extraordinary Desserts, Baskin Robbins, Coldstone, etc to find the «perfect cake» for every employee, and so naturally, people like me to go buy the cakes, or maybe it’s just because people are just too lazy to. I guess I’ll never know.
Anyway, I walked in around 11:45am and noticed that the cakes were very small round cakes, enough to feed 6 – 8 people, max. I asked the cashier if there were any larger sizes and she said that I’d have to pre-​order and they didn’t usually make such large cakes. That’s understandable so I’m about to walk out the door, until she has an epiphany and makes a comment that I had to share wih my fellow Unilocalers.
«Hey, you know what? You could check Vons! They have half sheet cakes there.»
Okay, maybe I’m being harsh, but really? You recommended me to Vons bakery? I don’t mean to offend bakeries inside grocery stores, but they usually do not have as diverse of a selection nor as delicious-​tasting, baked goods as an actual free-​standing bakery business, right? Do you feel like your bakery is comparable to a grocery store bakery then? I fought very hard to keep my eyes from rolling. So hard, in fact, that my gas-​permeable contact lenses almost popped out of my eyeballs.
Instead, I headed over to Flour Power bakery (also in El Cajon) instead, and what a great decision that was. Next Unilocal review coming up!
Check it out here:

I placed a large order for a special event. The day of the event I go to pick up the order and they drop a portion of it on the ground. They offer to pay me back some of the money but what am I supposed to tell my guests. I tell them to redo that portion and deliver and am told they don’t deliver. Girl behind the counter is like a deer in the headlines and doesn’t know what to do. She keeps trying to reach a manager, I try to reach the manager and it goes right to voicemail. This is some the most terrible customer service ever.

I spotted this bakery as I was heading home, so I stopped by to pick up some sweets for later.
When I came in nobody was at the front counter. I checked out a few things in the displays and then kinda peeked into the back and got the attention of a girl who was busy mixing flour.
I saw they had Florentine cookies, (
) cookies that I had not had for over eight years, and were a childhood favorite. I ask the girl for a couple and she gave me an extra one because she thought they were rather small. I also saw a couple of Boston Cream Pies, one of my favorites, but decided it was to much for me. It is a pie that is better off shared. They also had an array of doughnuts and cookies.
The cookies where a little on the chewy side but tasty. They ones I am used to or more on the crispy side. They cost .85 each. Overall the cookies good.
PS. don’t tell the Cookie Monster about this place!

WORST bakery in San Diego. I ordered my cake there for my baby shower the writing was horrible, a 2 year old could’ve done a better job and the decorations we’re beyond horrible. I ordered the cake in advance and the day before my shower they call and say they ran out of raspberry filling. I just thought ok I’ll just get raspberry cream but everything about the cake was horrible. I call to speak to a manager or owner no one was there, the girl took down my information do you think they called me back NO. Please I hope no one orders cakes from them they are beyond HORRIBLE!!!

My daughter just recently turn 5 and she had her cake made at Howards Bakery for the 2^nd already. Great job I have to say it was better than the first!

I love going to this bakery. They have wonderful products: cookies, doughnuts, cakes, pastry. I like the cashiers but I think they could use a little help in the business management department. The store looks unorganized and many times the products I like are not available. I love mom and pop businesses and I hope this one gets its act together so that it can keep going…

They get ONE STAR for being able to accommodate me for same day service.
I called this bakery around 11am to place a same day phone order for one full and quarter sheet cake. The cakes were white cake with strawberry filling and chocolate with bavarian cream. I explained on the phone that I’d like the full sheet frosted in white, bordered with gold/​yellow, writing in rust (or closest they can get), and the birthday number in black. Perfect, they said it can all be done by 6pm. As for the quarter sheet, I wanted the same colors, but with the writing to say, «We love you.» Keeping in mind that I am ordering this from a PROFESSIONAL bakery, I was hoping for some artistic ability to make a simple cake spark. FAIL!
When we got there to pick up the cake, I WAS EXTREMELY DISAPPOINTED! I am not a professional cake decorator, but I will proudly say, I’ve decorated cakes that look more professional than what I’ve received. So while the cake is on the counter and I’m looking at it, there’s a freaking fly that lands on it. I mentioned it to the girl and she takes a wooden skewer and scoops off the area that the fly landed on. She then asked me if I wanted her to remove that whole area and redo it (on a time crunch), or another option is that I didn’t have to take the cake with me (pre-​paid over the phone). My party was to begin in 1.5 hours, so leaving the cake was not an option.
I understand that I asked for something simple, and it was a same day order, but a little artistic skill would have gone a long way. On the quarter sheet, the icing (writing) was pushed into the frosting WTF! They didn’t even align the writing on the cake in the center. The numbers on the cake were so cheesy! Freaking straight from a plain piping bag… nothing special. They threw some chocolate sprinkles on it and ribbon after I complained. Anyway, I did some last minute touches to the cake that made it come alive as much as possible.
Howard’s bakery… NEVER AGAIN! :-(

I was craving cinnamon buns and years ago, this was the place to go for them. They were known to be get-there-early-you-weren’t-getting-one good cinnamon buns, dripping in cream cheese icing. Unfortunately they stopped selling them. So I still had a sweet tooth and had driven all the way here so I tried a few more things.
Cinnamon Crispy — was somehow flaky & soggy at the same time. I had tried one at Mary’s in Santee & been instantly hooked on them, but I didn’t eat more than a few bites of Howard’s.
Russian Tea Cakes (Mexican Wedding Cookie) — hard, dense & not melt in your mouth like most I have eaten or made myself. I usually can’t put these down — I didn’t even want to finish the first I’d started.
Donuts — VERY limited selection, and just your typical chain donut shop deal. My cake donut was soft, more like a bread than donut and greasy. Nothing like I would expect made fresh at a specialty bakery.
A nut cookie of some sort — I might have well licked a can of Crisco. It was greasy like they had iced the top in Crisco (and was soggy on the topmost part like it had soaked in) & it tasted like nothing else but Crisco & sugar.
So I wasted a trip out to El Cajon & $ 11.00. AND I’m still craving a cinnamon roll.

Fantastic. Fresh baked goods. Delicious cakes.

Howard’s has pretty good dounut holes especially if you get them while still hot. If your looking for cookies they make delicious angel cookies, although not always available.

We were craving pie, and an old rock star told of of this place, so we decided to check it out. Walking in, you’re hit will a large array of every type of sweet thing you could want. My group ordered a whole strawberry rhubarb pie, 2 slices of cheese cake, a cream puff, and strawberry cake. The best of it all was the strawberry cake. Soft, moist, sweet. No real strawberries in it though, lame. The next best (starting the slow decline of goodness) was the cheese cake. It was really sticky, not in a good way. It has a clear glaze coating on top of it, which was not horrible at all but had an odd texture. Then the cream puff. the pastry part was hollow and dried out, very stale and flavorless. The whipped cream part tasted like plastic, Also very old, stale. I’m sorry to have to write a less than superb rating, it truly does sadden me. But, so did my dessert.

Went here this morning and got quite a few donuts. They taste better than your typical donut shop. They had quite a large selection of all kinds of baked goods. They even had a Boston Crème Pie which is extremely hard to find here in San Diego. Prices are cheap too.
The only thing that lacked here was the service. It wasn’t very friendly and the girl that helped us didn’t look like she wanted to be there at all. But, still, the taste made up for the lack of service.

This is an old school bakery and there really isn’t much fancy to it — just good basic baked goods.
So, my FAVORITE has to be the éclair. They come in small and large and are filled with Bavarian Crème. I uploaded a pic of a small one and it’s really one the best deals I have found — it’s only $ 1.50.

This neighborhood bakery has been around for quite some time. When I first relocated to San Diego, I wanted to find a decent bakery, you know… the ones that bake every morning instead of baking a whole lot in one day to cover 3 days.
I adore Howard’s carrot cake, it’s moist, and fresh and the icing is a perfect union… not too sweet, not too plain mmmMMMmm. I also recommend the eclairs, one bite and the chocolate topping with the cake and fresh custard explode onto your palate and melt in your mouth. Nothing is better than an éclair with a fresh hot cup of coffee.
I had my Mother’s Day cake made here, and I was really impressed. The decorations were exactly as I had planned it and it turned out elegant. I haven’t had one dessert that had disappointed me. I just wish they could re-​decorate, it would really attact a lot more customers to actually sit down and enjoy their dessert.