Odette: Trust Your Food Spidey Sense

I have a Spidey sense for good food (not to brag).

I can walk past shop and cafe fronts with absolutely no idea what I'm looking for, and somehow something tells me to stop.

That's exactly what happened with Odette.

We weren't looking for food. We weren't even hungry. We were simply walking through Condesa when something about this small, rather unassuming bakery pulled us in. There isn't a big window display tempting you inside. From the outside, it doesn't scream destination bakery.

But something told us to walk in and have a poke around.

Then my eyes bugged out.

Because inside was a pastry case filled with the kind of things that make a baker stop in her tracks: gorgeous croissants, beautiful sandwiches, cakes, baguettes, focaccia, brioche, cookies and pastries in every direction.

And suddenly we were eating.

We grabbed one of the little tables outside, sitting in the sunshine overlooking Plaza Popocatépetl, the lovely little Art Deco circle at the heart of this corner of Condesa. Before long, a small line had started forming.

A bakery hiding in plain sight

Once inside, I realized I already knew the name. My kids had actually brought home Odette treats one day in December. We had shared a crujiente de guayaba, raspberry kouign-amann, almond croissant and some of their cookies, and I remember thinking the pastry was excellent. But I hadn't gone out of my way to visit the bakery myself.

I'm glad I finally did.

Odette is the creation of Mexico City pastry chef Odette Olavarri, who trained at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. She started giving cooking lessons to younger girls when she was just 14 and went on to study at Le Cordon Bleu in France and Mexico before working in professional kitchens in Mexico City. In 2019, she opened her first Odette in Lomas de Chapultepec, followed by this Condesa location in 2023.

You can see the French influence immediately in the beautiful laminated pastries and, particularly, in the baguettes.

And making a really good baguette is no small thing.

Odette has some lovely baguettes and uses them for gorgeous sandwiches, which is one of the things that makes this bakery feel different to me. This isn't simply somewhere to grab a croissant and leave.

You could come here for breakfast, pick up lunch, take home a beautiful loaf for dinner, buy a cake, or walk out with a box of cookies for someone you love.

In fact, El País describes Odette as the kind of bakery you can visit every day, whether you're there for a baguette, the turkey-and-cheese croissant or something sweet. Olavarri also deliberately introduces something new seasonally so regular customers have a reason to keep coming back.

And then there is the meringue

I am particularly impressed by the meringues.

Odette knows how to make a good meringue, and the fig meringue cake was one of my favorites. It comes as an individual seasonal dessert or as a larger cake, and the combination of crisp meringue, cream and figs is exactly the sort of thing I want.

And for you gluten-free people, this is your treat.

There are also plenty of things that travel well, which makes Odette a dangerous place for a visitor.

The Florentine pearls, the Luna cookies, brioche and other little treats make wonderful hostess gifts, and they're exactly the kind of thing I'd pick up before going to someone's house for dinner. Everything is beautifully packaged.

Odette and Rosetta

I've already been to Panadería Rosetta in Roma Norte and eaten the famous guava roll. It's excellent.

But Rosetta and Odette are very different beasts, though both are famed and run by very impressive women.

Panadería Rosetta opened in Roma in 2012 and has become one of Mexico City's best-known bakeries, with its breads, pastries and especially that guava roll.

The problem, for me, is the line.

It can be horrendous.

My secret tip, if you are not a line waiter: go to Lardo in Condesa, Elena Reygadas' restaurant, and grab a Panadería Rosetta pastry there instead. They have a little street side kiosk where you can grab coffee and a pastry.

Odette, on the other hand, needs no patience or tricks to get a pastry in your mouth.

It feels more like the kind of neighborhood bakery you could build into your everyday life. Breakfast. A sandwich. A baguette for dinner. A cake for a birthday. A box of cookies for a hostess gift. A pastry because you happened to walk past and your Spidey sense told you to stop.

Eating good pastry shouldn't be work but all pleasure.

Odette Condesa

Plaza Popocatépetl 35, Hipódromo, Condesa

This is the location I visited, with outdoor tables overlooking Plaza Popocatépetl.

Odette Lomas de Chapultepec

Monte Líbano 915, Local 18 B, Lomas de Chapultepec

The original Odette location, opened in 2019.

Odette at Museo Tamayo

Museo Tamayo, Paseo de la Reforma 51, Chapultepec

A smaller Odette outpost inside the museum.

Website: odette.com.mx