Oak Glen Recommendations

Thinking about a drive along the Oak Glen loop in the next couple of weekends. It’s been years since we’ve been there (keeps falling off my mental radar): any recommendations as far as baked/canned goods we should grab? (Also, any leads on cider donuts? I’ve never had one but keep stumbling across references and think they sound rather tasty.)

We go to Oak Glen 2-3x a year for a fun day trip. We haven’t found a place that really blows us away for baked goods. There’s huge lines at Apple Annies and they’re not bad but it’s not outstanding.

I do heartily recommend stopping at Mom’s for their canned jams, preserves, jellies, pickles etc. We stop there every time. They have a large variety and happily give you tastes. I also think the QPR is very good. I always stock up for my breakfast toast.

Cider donuts, go to Snow Line. They make them in front of you. There’s also Andy’s mini donuts by the petting zoo and attractions behind Apple Annies, but Snow Line is much better.

For cider, we like the small shop below and to the left of Law’s coffee show, if you’re looking at Law’s from their parking lot. I don’t recall if they’re affiliated or not.

Try to make time to go to the Wildlife Conservancy next to Riley’s farms. Free entry, but donations are accepted. It’s beautiful to walk the trails, look at the plants, big trees, etc. We also prefer Riley’s for the bags of apples, they carry a large selection of hard to find varieties at reasonable prices. We get 2-3 five pound bags and they keep well in the crisper. Good daily snack for next couple of weeks.

Riley’s also has a counter that serves sandwiches, tri-tip bbq and of course apple pie. It’s ok. In general, we haven’t found anything that blows us away. But if you go in with proper expectation of having some decent food, somewhat expensive and large portions, you know what you’re getting. We prefer to load up on breakfast on our way out there, maybe stop at SGV for a Chinese breakfast or grab a banh mi sandwich. We generally just snack on donuts, ice cream, cider and a slice of pie at Oak Glen.

We like the ice cream at Oak Glen Creamery. They use a Strauss base for their ice cream. Their baked goods are hit or miss, the apple pie is solid. They have a nice comfortable dining area, clean restrooms and there’s some interesting shops in the same complex. It’s a standard stop for us to walk around that complex. The cider and jams place on the lower level of that parking lot (blanking on the name) has our second favorite apple cider. Frequently we buy a half gallon from there and another half gallon from the Law’s location to have a variety.

This time of the year, the weekends are definitely the busiest. You will have a hard time finding parking at the Law’s/Apple Annie’s/Oak tree complex. That’s the big stop for everyone. Less problems at all the other ones, especially at Riley’s. They have a huge lot and it’s further up the loop. There’s also another lot for the Conservancy.

It’s a fun day trip for us. The drive out and back is low key, not a lot of traffic on the weekends. We just chat and enjoy the scenery and the drive goes by pretty fast. Bring a jacket with a hood and some bottles of water. It can get chilly and damp quickly and higher altitude can get dry too. The Stater Brothers grocery store, a couple of miles before the start of the loop is a good stop on the way home for restroom and any drink or snacks before the long drive back.

Let me know if there’s anything else.

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:heart_eyes::heart_eyes::heart_eyes:

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Thank you, thank you, thank you!

I think we have purchased apple butter and other such items from Mom’s, but am not certain. I do recall some good apple pastries (turnovers or hand pies?) but don’t remember where we found them.

Cider donuts: are they made from cider or…? Also, apple fritter ideas?

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We like Mom’s a lot, big fan of their preserves and fruit butters.

Just about every food place has apple pastries, possibly Apple Annie’s? Everyone stops there is its their first time. Might be worth checking out Oak Glen Creamery’s selection and see if anything jumps out at you. At the very least, it’s a lot easier to find parking and get in and out in that complex than Apple Annie’s/Law’s.

Cider donuts use cider for the liquid, they’re regular cake donuts with cinnamon, sugar, etc. Snow Line is busy enough that they turn it fast and they fry it well, hard to beat fresh donuts. Fresh donuts, hot coffee or cider sitting outside and enjoying the cool mountain setting, that’s a good combo.

I love apple fritters and haven’t found any that I like :cry::sob: If you find a good one, please report back.

Have fun! Oh and if you like yarn and fiber, check out the store that has alpaca products, they also have some very luxurious sweaters. It’s fun to poke in there and look at what they have. It’s tucked away across the street from the Apple Annie, up the side of the hill.

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Thanks to @ElsieDee for starting this thread, and to @Jase for your expertise! We decided to hop over on a spur of the moment trip. We arrived early Sunday afternoon and stopped in the Parrish Farm area to get out and do a walkabout. The items/brick-a-brack they sell there is interesting, and the twice a day pirate show even more odd. We did discover a sign that said Oak Glen Creamery ice cream and a mile-high Apple pie at Angus McCurdy’s across the way. They pump out ginormous apple pies loaded with 5 lbs of local apples all day long…they’re $22 a piece and we got one to go. I also wanted to try the ice cream, only to discover that the sign outside lies and it’s Blue Bunny ice cream and not Oak Glen Creamery…fail on my part. The server scooping out the ice cream opened the freezer and them took off a Blue Bunny lid before scooping my vanilla. I was dismayed and asked to verify if the ice cream was Oak Glen Creamery…she apologized and told me it was not.
We rolled over to Los Rios down the street for Apple picking. This place was a madhouse. Do yourself a favor and try to park offsite…the traffic rolling into Los Rios was crazy. They had an heirloom Arkansas Gold available for picking at $5/lb. and a sprinkling of Red Delicious and Rome/Rose apples for half that price. We had a good time in the orchards looking for ideal fruit. We rewarded ourselves with a half gallon of the farm’s Apple cider…and found it delightful. It was nice to sit on the shaded grassy knoll and just enjoy the scenery.
We hopped over to Mom’s and found jelly/preserve heaven. We fell in love with the Bunny mix (strawberries and peach), strawberry-lemon preserves, and the Dutch apple pie butter. The staff was really cool in letting us try and experiment with all of their options. We also found that they sell Old Towne Baking Company breads here…I buy them from my local farmer’s market. I can imagine coming back here to try new options or repurchase favorites.
We were late coming out this way and didn’t get a chance to stop at Snow Line for donuts and Oak Glen Creamery. But we had a good time and can envision coming up here to picnic in the future.
We stopped nearby to see my in-laws so I’ve not been able to try the pie…photos and review on that tomorrow…but the pie itself is lovely and HUGE. I also want to go see the alpacas because they amuse me.

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Awesome! Get out of the heat of LA and into the cool mountain air

I think you were in the right place. That would be a bummer if they stopped making their own ice cream and just carry Blue Bunny. We haven’t been this fall, last time we went, it was raining and we didn’t stop for ice cream.

Cool! They are super nice and we stop there every time.

Glad you had a good time!

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I think I may have been in the wrong area. The sign I saw was a banner hanging on a white picket fence across the street from Parrish House. I looked up Oak Glen Creamery on Yelp and the location seems to be in the Oak Tree Village complex down the road…not in the same area as Parrish and Angus McCurdy’s. I’m hoping we’ll be better prepared next time after this visit. Spur of the moment trips always entail a level of unpreparedness…and the ability to throw caution into the winds. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting…with the exception of all the farms, I thought there was one central area where you park and explore only to find that there were a bunch of areas where you can park and explore. Still excited to know that there’s plenty to do when we come up here next. I’ll have to post a photo and review of the mile high apple pie we took home once we have it for dessert tonight with a new batch of vanilla ice cream I made yesterday before we left.

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I think you were in the right area. But I will say I’m used to just going now and don’t pay a lot of attention to the names of the complexes.

Oak Tree Village is the one where Apple Annie’s and the petting zoo is located. At the Parrish Ranch spot, if you’re looking at the Parrish red barn shop where all the food stuff is located, Oak Glen creamery is to your left and up a slope. To the left of that are a bunch of shops. It does sound like you were in the right area and they changed it?

Here’s Parrish Ranch
https://www.yelp.com/biz/parrish-pioneer-ranch-yucaipa

Here’s Oak Glen Creamery
https://www.yelp.com/biz/oak-glen-creamery-yucaipa
That photo of the chalkboard is above the bakery display. You walk past the dining room and the counter is to your left and restrooms to your right.

Oak Tree Village is where it’s the most crowded and has Apple Annie’s to the right and Law’s to the left.
https://www.yelp.com/biz/oak-tree-village-oak-glen-yucaipa

Can I just say that overall Oak Glen’s site sucks? It’s website design from the prehistoric ages.

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Yes, you can definitely say that and yes, yes it does. (It’s even more fun on a phone!)

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Based on your directions alone, that’s exactly where I was at. I had to walk through Angus McCurdy’s and past the restrooms to get to the ice cream. You have to pay at the counter at Angus McCurdy before they walk into the dessert area to scoop your ice cream from a white and silver old school freezer. After opening the freezer, the attendant pulled out a Blue Bunny lid before scooping the vanilla bean cream. That’s when I asked if they made their ice cream because I was under the impression that they made their own. She apologized and said they did not. The chalkboard gives you the impression it’s Oak Glen Creamery because they still make pie shakes and have salted caramel as topping options. I tried vanilla bean, strawberry, and rainbow sherbet. The strawberry was definitely not fresh because it had an artificial taste to it, and I can’t even begin to imagine how anyone would be brave enough to make rainbow sherbet. The vanilla wasn’t bad, but it definitely didn’t taste home made. I’m super sad if Oak Glen Creamery is no more. I was really excited to try it.

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Angus McCurdy’s…pie time!
We saw this while we were exploring about.


The bakery counter said that they use 5 lbs. of fresh local apples in each pie. As you can tell, it’s quite huge…I used the honey container to help gauge size. While the bakery attendant said the best restaurant in town was Apple Annie’s, she said the best pie was here at Angus McCurdy’s. They were $22 each, and we picked a fresh-out-of-the-oven one up on our way out of town with the intent of having it for dessert at home later. We got sidetracked and ended up visiting my in-laws in nearby Hemet, so it ended up in our fridge for one night.
Warmed it up in the oven while we made dinner, and it was perfect by the time we needed dessert. The crust was nice and flakey, and my husband adored the sugar dusted top crust. I really enjoyed the complexity of the filling because you know they used a variety of apples…it was spiced well, just the right amount of tart and sweet, and there was texture left in the apples because they weren’t baked within an inch of their lives. It’s easily one of the best apple pies we’ve ever had. Paired with some vanilla ice cream that I had made the day before, it was perfect. However, I wish they had cooked down the apples a bit before filling the crust. As you can see the apples baked down quite a bit leaving a huge space between apples and top crust. But it was still delicious. We’d gladly pick up another one the next time we come to town.

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Apparently I’m getting senile in my old age. My wife reminded me that we haven’t stopped there for ice cream in well over a year since it’s been cold and rainy our last few visits. But not only that, our last attempt for ice cream, they didn’t have any homemade ice cream and we left. So yeah, I’m a forgetful idiot, sorry for leading you and @ElsieDee astray.

I guess it is just good for the occasional pastry and restroom stop.

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No worries, @Jase. Part of the adventure is trying new things that other folks have suggested. They only way to know that it’s not Oak Glen Creamery anymore was for one of us to give it a go and verify. While I wouldn’t return for the ice cream alone, I am game to try one of their apple pie milkshakes where they add a slice of their delicious pie into the blender. Next time, I need to go to Snow Line for cider donuts…and give your Law’s cider a try.
FYI, I discovered that Mom’s Country Orchards has a website that you can order their jarred goods from…in case you find yourself running low and don’t want to trek all the way up there.

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