This San José Pop-Up Bakery Sells 18 Different Varieties of Egg Tarts

You might imagine that most egg tarts are relatively indistinguishable , with their pastry cups and plain, sunglow-colored custard filling. You wouldn’t necessarily expect the treats to get remixed into dozens of different flavors.

That hasn’t stopped A&M Pâtisserie. The San José–based bakery pop-up sells a whopping eighteen different egg tart flavors, many of them inspired by various Asian cuisines. At a makers’ market at the Santa Clara Convention Center in November, a perpetual line of at least fifty customers swarmed the A&M booth for hours, everyone scanning the banner menu to decide which of the palm-sized egg tarts to order. A wide range of unconventional toppings included things like toasted marshmallows, flame-kissed corn kernels, milk crumbs and caramelized banana slices.

Alice Ngo and Minh Pham first started making egg tarts at home during the COVID lockdown. “We got laid off and had nothing to do,” says Pham. “Alice got bored and started baking.”

Ngo taught herself how to make Portuguese egg tarts (aka pastéis de nata) by watching YouTube videos. After getting positive feedback from friends and family, the couple started selling the pastries to the public through Instagram and Facebook.

“I wasn’t a baker, I was a cook,” says Pham. “But I enjoy pastries since I was born in France.”

He moved to the United States in 2016 to pursue a tech career, but decided against working a desk job. Instead, he started working in restaurants and took cooking classes through the hospitality management program at Mission College. These days, Pham is the primary egg tart producer, juggling the pop-up with his day job as a baker at Alexander’s Patisserie. Meanwhile, Ngo uses her experience working at a hotel to handle the pop-up’s front-of-house operations and customer service.

The defining characteristic of a Portuguese-style egg tart is the custard filling’s blistered, caramelized top, which sets it apart from both British egg tarts and Cantonese dan tat — the popular dim sum dish that is probably the best-known egg tart variation here in the Bay Area. Meanwhile, Macau, a former Portuguese territory, is known for egg tarts with a scorched custard that’s eggier and less sweet than pastel de nata. The distinctions between the styles have blurred over time, but originally British custard tarts used a shortbread crust and the others were made with puff pastry.

Ngo and Pham eventually shifted away from the traditional pastel de nata because they wanted their egg tarts to be lighter and less sweet. They make the puff pastry shell extra-crispy and flaky to complement their creamy custards.

“I wanted something in between so I took the best of both and created my own,” says Pham. “It’s not Macau. It’s not Portuguese. It’s A&M’s.”

But the biggest thing that sets A&M Pâtisserie’s egg tarts apart is the sheer variety of flavors. The menu is ever growing as the bakers draw inspiration from their favorite pastries and restaurant dishes. Their guava egg tart is modeled after the guava-and-cheese strudel at Porto’s, the legendary Los Angeles–based Cuban bakery. The corn cheese flavor was inspired by kon-chijeu, their favorite Korean banchan. A few of A&M’s egg tarts, like the honey-garlic flavor, even have savory elements. The bakery also sells cookies, macarons and canelés.

A&M’s first large pop-ups were at FoodieLand’s 2023 festival series, which spanned several cities including Sacramento, Berkeley and San Mateo. Now, the bakery’s busiest events of the year are SJMade’s November Holiday Fair and its Winter Wonder Market in December. “The first year, we brought 600 and sold out within three hours,” Pham says of the holiday fair. “Then, the second year we brought 800 and sold out by 2 p.m.” This year, they scaled up to 1,500 egg tarts for each day of the two-day event, which required an entire month of prep time. The most time-consuming component is the multi-layered puff pastry, which takes hours to assemble.

During my visit to the A&M booth at last month’s SJMade Holiday Fair, I split a six-pack of egg tarts with my fiancée, my cousin and his girlfriend. After each bite, there was an audible “mmm” from each member of the party. We loved the classic egg tart custard’s glassy surface and creamy, light interior. My favorite was the yuzu egg tart, which had an intense acidity to balance the butteriness of the crust and strips of candied yuzu peel to mellow out the experience. A close second was the seasonal pistachio egg tart with chunks of pistachio on top for some crunch. Each person in the group had their own favorite.

The bakery’s next step will be to experiment with savory egg tarts that have a quiche-like filling. Pham plans to introduce these to the menu once he figures out a way to bring an oven into their pop-up space, so he can serve them warm. He and Ngo are also constantly improving their existing flavors — the matcha egg tart is being upgraded to matcha mochi, and the s’mores tart will soon incorporate homemade marshmallow. The pop-up’s next seasonal special is a salted egg yolk tart that’s scheduled to release around Lunar New Year.

“We have 18 flavors of egg tarts now,” says Pham. “I can say confidently we’re the only ones offering that many flavors.”

A&M Pâtisserie pops up at events around the Bay. The next pop-up is at the SJ Made Winter Wonder Market at South Hall (435 S. Market St., San José) on Dec. 13–14, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.