Continental Kosher’s Jacob Evron Still Baking After All These Years

It’s around 8 a.m. on a Wednesday and 72-year-old Jacob Evron, head baker at Continental Kosher Bakery in Valley Village, is finishing his shift. But he has one last job to do before he wraps up: assembling and frosting a two-tier, strawberry shortcake wedding cake. (He is accustomed to doing much bigger cakes but because of COVID-19, he said, everything is scaled down.) 

Watching him spin the cake on a metal stand, gently gliding an improvised tool over the buttercream to create a perfectly smooth finish, is mesmerizing. He is a master. But he never planned to become a baker.

The way Evron tells it, “I arrive in Los Angeles on Thursday, I work in bakery on Friday.” The year was 1969, and Evron, who was born in Silesia (Germany/Poland) but spent most of his life in Israel, was 21. He came to Los Angeles for an American woman named Peggy whom he had met briefly in Israel. Her family took him in as one of their own, which meant working at their business: Famous Bakery on Fairfax.

According to Evron, Famous was on the “wrong” side of the street. All the other bakeries, he recalled, were on the opposite side: Diamond, Canter’s, Schwartz’s, King David and Papa Jack. But, he added, “Next door was a little beauty shop. All those ladies came to do their hair and put in their orders.”

In Israel, Evron had studied auto mechanics in high school. In the army, he repaired and serviced tanks. “Not one tank went to war without my signature,” he said. No one in his family worked in food either. Nor were they keen on him doing so. 

“My mom wanted me to become an architect,” he said. “My father wanted me to become an innovation engineer.” But Evron, who initially worked in the front of the house at Famous, found he had a knack for sales. Then one day, the matriarch of his adopted family fell ill, and Evron was asked to try his hand at baking. He also discovered that his skills as a painter translated to cake decorating. (His father had worked in a paint factory in Israel so there was always paint around for him to play with.)

Although Evron and Peggy’s relationship did not last, he ended up working at Famous for almost 20 years, sometimes working both the counter and in the kitchen simultaneously, which suited him. 

“You know what the secret of a good baker is? You have to be very lucky to work with the right person and you have to be so good and so nice they give you the recipe. I worked in 500 bakeries. I got 500 recipes, too.”  — Jacob Evron

“I cannot concentrate on one thing,” he said. “I like to work on a few things together at the same time. I used to mix five machines together and work on the bench and decorate. ‘Work on the bench’ means make coffee cake, danishes, rugelach.”

On Saturdays, his day off, he worked at another bakery in Canoga Park. And over the years, he did stints at several other Los Angeles area bakeries, most of them long gone: Dov’s, Weby’s, Plaza West, Solly’s.

“You know what the secret of a good baker is?” Evron said. “You have to be very lucky to work with the right person and you have to be so good and so nice they give you the recipe. I worked in 500 bakeries. I got 500 recipes, too.” 

Evron started at Continental in 1990. He worked full time until the pandemic hit. Now he works just a couple of days a week, arriving in the wee hours of the morning and working with a crew of mostly younger Latino men. He said if he had to pick one item to represent him and the bakery, it would be coffee cake. But his repertoire is extensive: rye bread, chiffon cakes, kichel (bow tie shaped cookies), and an array of sugar-free items for in-store sales and clients such as The Jewish Home.

This time of year, though, with the High Holy Days approaching, the kitchen also turns out a couple of specialty items: apple challah made with fresh apples and cinnamon, and taiglach, crispy dough bites made with nuts and dried fruit and touched with honey. Both items are available through Sukkot only.

Although Evron loves bread, and cake even more, he tries not to overindulge. His favorite is something you won’t find in a Jewish bakery at all. It’s the classic Mexican cake known as Tres Leches.

The septuagenarian, who lives just a few blocks from the bakery, isn’t a big one for down time. He likes to keep busy. To that end, he recently renovated his entire home by himself. He calls Home Depot “my Disneyland.” And he has started painting again. “I’m a renaissance man,” he said.

As for retirement, it doesn’t seem to be part of his vocabulary. “I just talked to my friend in Florida,” he said. “He said I’m going to work in a bakery until I die.”