At the East Bay’s lone location of this local Filipino bakery chain, there’s no need to look beyond its trademark offering: señorita bread, a kind of cross between a dinner roll and a sweet, buttery pastry. Crucially, the bread is served piping-hot out of the oven all day long, and you can buy a huge boxful for around $10. It makes the most welcome addition to any potluck or barbecue.

Tucked away in a cluster of warehouses on a side street next to the freeway, Gran Milan is one of Richmond’s real hidden gems. This little bakery has a short menu of pizzas and salads, but the main attractions are some of the finest Italian pastries in the Bay — a truly impressive lineup of flaky, delicate, and often-custard-filled beauties.

Plan ahead before making a trip to this buzzy French bakery, which, despite its tiny, anonymous-looking storefront, draws some of the East Bay’s longest lines every weekend — to the point that if you arrive more than an hour after it opens for the day, you may find that everything in the display case has sold out. Buttery croissants are the biggest draw here, but the kouign amann, canelés, and Portuguese egg tarts all also have faithful followings.

Husband and wife team Paul and Marcia Masse consistently produce some of the most gorgeous cakes and European-style patisserie in the East Bay. Call ahead to order museum-quality cakes and tarts, or stop by for a coffee and pastry at their North Berkeley bakery.

It's a no-frills place that constantly has a line, but Acme is a wonderland of bread. Step up to the counter and choose from sweet and savory loaves, and pastries like flaky croissants, madeleines, and danishes. Sourdough, challa, olive loaf, pain de mie, and sticky cinnamon currant bread are all made fresh daily. Pop into Bartavelle a few doors down for a coffee while you wait.

Berkeley's Crixa Cakes has a wide array of specialty cakes and baked goods, with an emphasis on Hungarian, Russian, Central European, and American treats. That means cakes like amaretti cream cake and black forest cakes sit side-by-side with pavé vergiate, a flourless chocolate cake. And the bakery’s generous deep-dish fruit pies are second to none — whether it’s peak summer pitted fruit season or during the throes of your holiday-driven pumpkin pie cravings.

Sam Butarbutar and Wenter Shyu made a name for Third Culture Bakery before even opening the Berkeley brick-and-mortar. Their cult-hit mochi muffins first made their way through Bay Area coffee shops and converted legions to Third Culture’s Asian-inspired treats. Start with the original mochi muffin, a squishy riff on Hawaiian butter mochi infused with coconut and pandan, and then move on to the matcha custard cakes and passion fruit-glazed mochi doughnuts.

This “pocket sized” bakery sharing space with The Kebabery in Berkeley, offers some of the best desserts and pastries made with seasonal fruits. Although its hours are limited to Friday through Sunday for now, items like the recent sesame chiffon and blood orange marmalade cake (sold in slices) and black sesame éclairs will have you planning a trip around their opening.

Firebrand has a treasure trove of unique pastries, including preztel buns stuffed with gruyere and dusted with pimentón pepper, mini apple pies, and cinnamon sugar pretzels, but their breads aren't to be ignored. In particular, the savory scone is a treat of bacon, cheddar, mozzarella and chives; the croissant Pullman loaf is a must for sandwiches at home.

This bakery is creating its own special brand of pastries mixing Asian flavors with traditional baking techniques. Take the strawberry-kinako bun, a baked croissant bun filled with kinako pastry cream and strawberry jam, or the gorgeous, colorful swirls atop their cereal buns. It’s a playful take on desserts that will be nostalgic for many.

Literally an underground bakery, located in little basement on an Uptown Oakland side street with barely any exterior signage, Gregory’s has nevertheless long been a local cult favorite for cheesecakes and pies. Try any of the most popular offerings — say, the lemon bars, the snickerdoodles, or the peach cobbler — and you’ll become a believer too.

For the most flaky, layered, and buttery egg tarts in the East Bay, there is only one place to go: Ruby King. The old-school, no-frills spot in Oakland Chinatown does brisk to-go business, serving a variety of Chinese buns for about a buck. But those egg tarts, with their quivering, still-warm centers? Just 95 cents apiece.

Unsurprisingly, Pietisserie is all about the pies and nothing but the pies. Baker Jaynelle St. Jean sells her craveworthy pies out of a petite shop in Oakland, offering flavors like ginger lemon custard, spiced apple, beet, and chocolate pecan. Flavors change daily, so check in before heading over.

Alameda’s best bakery comes from pastry chef Beth Woulfe and baker Christian Fidelis de Goes, industry vets who met while working at Bouchon Bakery in New York. Breakfast pastries particularly sing here, but the breads, cookies, and French-style desserts all measure up, too.

Glistening challah, pointy baguettes, and custardy porridge loaves greet customers at As Kneaded Bakery, arguably the most serious bread bakery in the East Bay. The naturally leavened miche is extra tangy, the baguettes caramelized and crunchy, and the challah unusually eggy. You can find As Kneaded’s breads at some farmers markets and grocery stores across the Bay Area throughout the week, but head to the San Leandro HQ on weekends for treats.

One of the Bay Area’s only Portuguese bakeries, this family-run gem in Hayward is worth a trip for the pasteis de nata (Portuguese egg tarts) alone. The shop also carries a variety of other hard-to-find pastries and breads, as well as as imported foods like sausages, cheeses, and canned fish.