Pancho’s Bakery in Kensington Market is in a funky little building which houses a handful of Latin food purveyors.
We enter a door, walk through a series of food stalls in the building, some of them Mexican-themed. I pause by three molcajete bowls of salsa (one may have been queso), noting that I must come back to try other food stalls, too.
Our Kensington Market food tour group keeps moving until we’ve reached an open area in the back, with a shade tree, a long white wall with black-line drawings and a ledge to sit on.
A man nearby tries to finish a cell phone conversation, sitting on the stoop of a building next to us, as our noisy group settles in.
Churros at Pancho’s Bakery in Kensington Market
We’re here at Pancho’s Bakery for a Mexican-inspired churro dessert. Churros are long donut-like desserts which are typically covered in cinnamon sugar.
At Pancho’s, the churros are vegan and Halal, which makes them accessible to the whole group.
Dulce de Leche
Our food tour guide, Mike, gives us a choice of plain churro or dulce de leche-filled churro. I have to opt for the filled churro, because, dulce de leche!
Dulce de leche, which means sweet made of milk in Spanish, is created with sweetened condensed milk, heated slowly, which caramelizes the sugar in the milk and creates a thick syrup which is almost caramel-flavoured, but a little bit different.
My mom used to make dulce de leche for us when we were kids, by simmering a can of sweetened condensed milk in a pan of water for many hours.
Then there was the time that we let the water get too low and the can exploded all over our kitchen…
Pancho’s fills the long centre of the churro, which is hollow, with the dulce de leche. As I eat it, the sweet sauce oozes out of the donut, past the paper wrapper, and down the front of my shirt.
This is typical for me. It’s a running joke. I manage to get something on me at every occasion. Fortunately, our tour is wrapping up, so I can go home to soak my shirt.
Enjoyed July, 2019
Pancho’s Bakery
214 Augusta Ave, Toronto, ON M5T 2L4
+1 (416) 854-8770
