Los Angeles is known for many signature foods — but according to a recent Food & Wine ranking, everyone should be paying more attention to the city’s flaky pastries and fluffy cakes.
LA was named the top pastry city in the U.S., and called a “sunny West Coast pastry paradise” in a recent article by Joy Cho as part of the magazine’s 2026 Global Tastemakers Awards. The rankings were determined by a panel of food and travel experts.
Cho pointed to spots like BadAsh Bakes in Pasadena, known for its matcha cinnamon rolls and cookies, as well as creative pastries from Fondry in Highland Park and Petitgrain Boulangerie in Santa Monica. Hannah Ziskin’s popular slab cakes at Echo Park pizzeria Quarter Sheets also got a shout-out (she was named a Food & Wine Best New Chef in 2023).
New York City, Chicago and Austin, Texas, came in second, third and fourth on the list, while San Francisco placed fifth. Bay Area bakeries given a nod included Arsicault Bakery, Loquat and B. Patisserie.
The San Francisco Standard editor-at-large Sara Deseran recently lamented that the Bay Area’s bakery scene isn’t getting its due, writing in a column Wednesday, “The Bay Area is rich in high-level pastry. Lamination has been pushed to extremes. Flavors that once would have seemed radical — pandan-coconut, raspberry-yuzu, galbijjim, za’atar-lamb — are par for the course.”
Overall, LA fared much better than the Bay Area in this year’s Global Tastemakers Awards. The magazine also named the best US cities for food and drink (LA came in third, behind New York City and Chicago; San Francisco placed fifth) and the best cities for coffee (LA once again came in third; San Francisco placed eighth). LAX was named the seventh-best airport in the country for food options. And in the magazine’s rankings of the best restaurants in the county, LA’s Hayato came in sixth, while Mister Jiu’s in SF placed 10th. Kabawa in New York City took the crown.