Dos Hermanos’ huge new bakery has a cafe, Mexican pastries and chopped sandwiches from a noted Portland chef - OregonLive

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Dos Hermanos is leveling up.

The busy bakery from Yucatán-born brothers Gabriel and Josue Azcorra will debut a new Southeast Portland facility with its own grain silo and retail cafe starting Friday, December 22.

Anchoring a ChefStable-backed complex also home to Lil’ America food cart pod, Fracture Brewing’s taproom and seafood raw bar Cache Cache, the new bakery is quadruple the size of the North Portland original.

In addition to fresh-baked bread, the bakery’s upcoming cafe will highlight Yucatecan pastries, Mexican coffee from Portland’s Tostado roasters and a new lineup of chopped sandwiches from Lardo chef Rick Gencarelli.

“Having this bigger space allows us to work on our Mexican pastries, empanadas, conchas, cuernitos, hojaldras, and to incorporate more flavors from our Mexican roots into our regular stuff, like danishes, croissants, but incorporating more flavors from our Mexican roots” said Josue Azcorra.

The cafe — with ample light from south- and west-facing windows — also features a tall mural of Chichén Itzá, the historic Mayan city 90 minutes east of Mérida, where the brothers were born.

Visit Friday, and you might find five Azcorra brothers, plus mom and dad, among some 64 employees mixing, proofing, baking and packaging an impressive amount of bread.

Since firing up the new ovens in October, the brothers and their team have been making around 18,000 sandwich-sized loaves of ciabatta alone each week, putting Dos Hermanos on par with larger bakeries such as Grand Central and Portland French.

They’re also producing a special 16-inch roll exclusively for a new lineup of chopped sandwiches from Gencarelli. Those include the Beast Master, with roast beef and horseradish; the Papa Gabe, with ham, queso fresco and chicharrones; and the Bad Bing, with Italian cold cuts, mayo, mustard, red wine vinaigrette and olive oil all chopped to order and stuffed into those fluffy rolls. Sandwiches will be available from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.

The pastries and sandwiches should be interesting, but bread is what the Azcorras know best, and what will pay the bills. In addition to ciabatta, Gabriel, Josue and their team produce full-sized sourdough loaves, San Francisco-style Dutch crunch rolls and fluffy English muffins you might have already discovered at your nearest New Seasons.

The brothers began baking two decades ago at Delphina’s, the former Northeast Portland bakery from Carolyn Mistell that Josue describes as a “our school.”

“I started as a dishwasher,” Josue Azcorra said. “Then they gave me the opportunity to learn mixing, shaping, everything. Then to be part of the supervisory team, learn how to run the schedules, come up with new recipes, they taught us all that stuff.”

By 2016, when Delphina’s abruptly closed, the brothers were managing the business, selling $400,000 worth of bread per month and sending shipments north to Washington and south to California through large accounts including Trader Joe’s and Costco.

Gabriel Azcorra left town for a job at The Essential Baking Company, the Seattle bakery that had quietly bought Delphina’s in 2012. Meanwhile, Josue Azcorra landed at Fleur de Lis, the great Hollywood neighborhood bakery, where he worked under Delphina’s and Pearl Bakery co-founder Greg Mistell.

In 2017, ChefStable owner Kurt Huffman reached out to the brothers to see if they might be interested in taking over Philippe’s Bread, an 1,800-square-foot bakery originally opened by French baker Philippe Garcia to fuel several ChefStable restaurants, including the rapidly growing Lardo.

Huffman told the brothers that if they managed to turn the business around, they could earn an ownership stake in the business. After rebranding as Dos Hermanos in 2018, the bakery quickly turned a profit. The brothers now own 50.1% of the business.

“It’s a blessing, man,” said Josue Azcorra. “Like my dad, I’ve got five kids, and I want them to go to college. And to do that, it takes money. That is one of the things that makes me stand up and work hard every day, to know that one day my oldest son could come in and run this place. It’s a dream for me and Gabe.”

Dos Hermanos will open for sandwiches from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. starting on Friday, Dec. 22, with earlier hours (but no sandwiches) starting on Dec. 26. at 1015 S.E. Stark St., 971-266-8348, doshermanosbakery.com

— Michael Russell; mrussell@oregonian.com

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