Taste of Sacramento: Historic district offers tasty bakery and a patisserie

Karen’s Bakery and Cafe has been a fixture in Folsom’s historic district for the better part of two decades. It’s a counter-service restaurant specializing in fresh, seasonal fare. There’s a breakfast menu, a lunch menu and an assortment of freshly-baked pastries, pies and cakes.

Popular breakfast items include the corned beef hash, for $14. The corned beef is cured in-house, topped with an egg (sunny side up) and served with sourdough toast.

The dessert side of the menu features brownies, cookies, muffins, pastries, pies and cakes. Owner Karen Holmes is particularly fond of the almond polenta pound cake. As the name suggests, it’s a pound cake with an almond paste, with polenta added in addition to the flour. The texture has a bit of a crunch, and it’s the perfect background for any summer fruit, especially when accompanied by ice cream or whipped cream.

Like many restaurants, Karen’s Bakery was hit hard by the coronavirus shutdown.

“I honestly thought, this is the way my business is going to die,” said Holmes. She was forced to reduce the menu and decrease staff, cutting her 26-member crew down to a core group of just six.

“I said to all my employees, ‘I’m not laying you off, I’m not firing you. ... All I want is for you to go home for a little while. Be brave, pinch your pennies ... and if we can keep it afloat, then as soon as we can, we’ll call you back.”

Initially, the bakery survived with the support of the community, with customers dropping by for takeout and curbside meals. But as time went on, Holmes discovered a new niche: the Karen’s Bakery and Cafe marketplace.

It was the height of the homemade banana bread craze. But grocery stores were depleted and customers couldn’t find the right ingredients.

The bakery had no shortage of flour. Bread flour, wheat flour, cake flour. Hundreds of pounds were delivered weekly. Holmes began packaging it in 5-pound ZipLock bags to sell to customers. It was the start of her own little marketplace, which she refers to as “the KBC grocery store.” Holmes even brought back another employee whose sole function was flour packaging.

The marketplace expanded from there. The inventory grew to include yeast, sugar, corn meal, beans, rice, produce, chickens and eggs. Eventually, Holmes began offering household items like toilet paper, paper towels and bleach.

Karen’s Bakery and Cafe has reopened once again. Their patio space, combined with an adjacent area, can accommodate almost 70 socially-distanced customers.

“We didn’t close, we didn’t shut down,” Holmes said. “We are your neighborhood bakery. We have stuff you might need.”

Julian’s Patisserie Cafe

Julian’s is located just across the bridge from the historic district. It’s open daily for breakfast and lunch, and the menu features a variety of crepes, both sweet and savory, as well as quiches, sandwiches and an assortment of pastries and desserts.

“Everything is super-fresh,” said owner and executive chef Julian Perrigo-Jimenez. The pastries are baked daily, and even the laminated doughs (used for croissants, danishes, cinnamon rolls and other pastries) are made in-house.

Perrigo-Jimenez imports his butter from New Zealand. It has a richer flavor, he explained. Butter doesn’t have a lot of ingredients, so the quality comes down to the cow. And this particular butter is produced by free-range, grass-fed New Zealand cows.

Julian’s is a “fast-casual,” counter-service style restaurant. Perrigo-Jimenez likes to track orders by name, not number. “We get to know everybody that way,” he explained.

Popular menu items include the quiche ham and cheese ($8.75) and the turkey and pesto crepe ($10.95), which is made with fresh tomatoes and mozzarella cheese.

Perrigo-Jimenez grew up in Folsom. Just two weeks after graduating high school, he had already moved on to the next school. He wanted to learn the art of pastries, and he enrolled at San Francisco’s California Culinary Academy.

After the academy, it was time to find a job, and Perrigo-Jimenez spent a couple of years working on cruise ships. He later moved to Las Vegas, where he found his way into the kitchen of several high profile Las Vegas hotels, including the Paris Hotel, Bellagio Resort and Caesars Palace.

He started as a sous chef, eventually working his way up to the top job of executive pastry chef. The money was good, but the work was stressful.

“That’s why I’ve always had a passion for wanting to own my own business,” said Perrigo-Jimenez. “I don’t have to answer to anybody. I get to just do what makes me happy. I come to work every day and enjoy it...It’s a better way to live my life.”

Karen’s Bakery

Address: 705 Gold Lake Dr, Folsom

Menu: karensbakery.com

Phone: (916) 985-2665

Julian’s Patisserie and Cafe

6610 Folsom-Auburn Rd #7, Folsom

Phone: (916) 936-4735

This story was originally published July 24, 2020 at 1:02 PM.