BREAD, glorious bread…
Here is another bakeshop with a history—Kamuning Bakery in Quezon City, Metro Manila.
If Dimas-alang Bakery in Pasig, founded during the 1920s, is tied up with the history of the city when it used to be a town in Rizal, Kamuning Bakery (tel. 929-2216), is likewise intimately connected with the founding and growth of the city named after President Manuel L. Quezon.
As Quezon City developed, with an income higher than that of Makati City, the country’s financial center, humble Kamuning Bakery remained blissfully in its original location (43 Judge Jimenez St., Brgy. Kamuning).
The rise of the supermarkets may have cut into its earnings, but business remains solid, the neighborhood bakery having developed a loyal clientele through the decades. Matrons from outside the barangay (village) with cars, their drivers waiting dutifully, can be seen buying bread, biscuits, egg pies, and other such goodies.
Why one of the customers used to be Cory Aquino (later President), no less.
And Kamuning Bakery now has a new owner, newspaper lifestyle/business columnist Wilson Lee Flores.
The original owners of the bakery were Marcelo and Leticia Bonifacio, who at the time were already operating a successful bakeshop in Manila called Los Baños Bakery. This second bakery was one of the first structures in Kamuning, along with a barber shop, grocery, schools and a church.
Operations were rudely interrupted during the Japanese Occupation of the 1940s. Imported flour was expensive and difficult to find. In February 1945 came the Battle of Manila, with the capital city bombed by the Americans and sacked by the Japanese. The southern districts of Intramuros, Ermita and Malate went up in flames. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed, among them Leticia’s father, Miguel Bonifacio, and her husband Marcelo Javier.
Widowed, Leticia, who was actually a lawyer, continued to run the business with her uncle Ambrosio Ison. Her bakers remained loyal to her. Helping out was Leticia’s 5-year-old son, Teddy Javier, who would sell pan de sal to customers, three pieces of which then cost five centavos.
Teddy grew attached to the business, all the way to adolescence, college life, adulthood and employment as an ABS-CBN salesman. Eventually he resigned and took over management of the bakery. Business picked up when they were able to deliver bread to New Frontier, South Supermarket and Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets in Manila.
When his mother passed away, Teddy bought the bakery and the property from his two siblings so he could have a free hand in keeping the family business going, and preserving its by now popular name.
One of the bakery’s bestsellers is the Pan de Suelo, a favorite of President Cory. “This kind of bread requires a special skill to bake,” says Teddy. “It is cooked on the oven’s floor and the heat is circulated equally to ensure it is cooked perfectly.” Their bread is baked in a wood-fired oven, which gives the products a distinct flavor.
In this day and age, netizens have taken note of Kamuning Bakery. One blogger, Richric, raved about the bakery’s egg pie: “I tell you the consistency of the egg filling is practically leche flan! The bakery has other delights, but the egg pie is what it’s been known for.”