La Carreta

Great panaderia. and produce meat counter looks sketchy. the place smells weird though. I always get the side eye cause Im white and my Spanish is bad. its an ok palce

Just because I have no other choice sometimes. They carry some things that Albertsons across the street don’t. How some people have given it 5 starts is beyond me. For starters their carts suck so when you opt to use baskets they are on the other side by the «exit» door. That exit door can’t be used to enter, unless it’s after 9 something when they close the entrance door, but you have people exit the «front» door & jam it up. Their fruits & veggies are ok. They may have «low» prices but their quality speaks about why the price is low on some of them. They can be rotting & still there on display & I’m not talking about 1 or 2 pieces it can be a good amount. I stopped by to get some dry packaged soup & come to find out it had bugs in it. Not sure if it was the store’s fault or the supplier but yuck! Their meat department has a ticket dispenser that never has tickets & obviously isn’t used so you can be waiting by a certain type of meat (pork, chicken, beef… etc) the person closest to them gets helped before you. The refrigeration system for the sliced meats needs to be fixed. There is constantly water leaking on some of the meat. The store for the most part is clean but kids had to use the restroom once & OMG! No toilet paper, toilet was nasty, soap dispenser was full of hand sanitizer. Don’t expect to walk in & out from this place either. They can have 2 register open with quite a few people in each & not call anyone else.

A good place to shop if you like Mexican food. A great variety of fresh produce. Prices are very low compared to the regular supermarkets like Albertsons or Vons.

This is my go to market for cheap vegetables. 5 lbs of Roma tomatoes for $ 0.99 on special days. Staff is super friendly and helpful. You will walk out with bags of fresh fruits and veggies for under $ 10.
The meat section is great, too. I will pick up pounds of seasoned taco meat or pork. Fresh tortilla chips and flour tortillas made daily. Plenty of parking, accepts American Express, great selection.

Great regional market. Huge selection of Latino Products. The cashiers get you in and out quickly. If you’re in the area and want quick service, this is the place for you.

A nice, clean, friendly super market with lots of fresh meats, seafood, baked goods and ethnic food at very low prices.
We live near the market for 25 years and never tried it. But once we went in we found a lot of specialty foods that we like. We have been back a few times each week for their fantastic sales items.
Check their sales on line or in paper ads.

Absolutely love this store. Their fruit is very fresh. This location is very clean and their employees are very helpful. Their Pan dulce is delicious. I plan to make this my go to spot from now on.

My favorite grocery store. They have great prices and always have fresh tortillas and bread. Try to come on the weekdays because it gets crowded on the weekends.

Giving them five stars just for their Ceviche alone. Love the market, always treated well and I find the employees very friendly. Marinated meats are excellent. Flies? BFD, You’re going to cook it anyway aren’t you?

I am very disappointed! This is the store that i go to when i am unable or too lazy to drive to Santa Ana for meat or menudo. We went to the meat dept to buy some menudo and as i was walking to the produce my little girl yells, «mommy a bird» there was a bird in the produce section and of course she wanted to look at it. We watched the bird for a good 5 minutes during this time it stopped on several vegetables and fruit before pooping on the broccoli. We thought it was funny but gross. My daughter decides she has to go potty and we head to the restroom and boy oh boy the restroom was digusting! The entire walls where filthy. Not one little clean area. The ceilings had paper balls all over. The soap dispenser had no lid and who knows what could possibly be in there. Obviously the employees use this restroom and it saddens me that they would not take the time to clean it. It really made me think, if the restroom is this filthy I wonder how their back rooms or prep areas which are not visible to the public are? Hhhmmmm?

This is where I usually shop and never spend too much! Meat, produce, fresh Mexican bread/​tortilla, etc
Veggies are seriously half or a third of the price they sell at Albertsons. You can even find kale now for $.99 a bunch.
Service is good and they always greet you. The only thing that would take me back to other supermarkets is organic milk and better deli meats (some are presliced here and dont feel as fresh) but this is definitely the place to go for cheap, good groceries!

I am a huge fan. I think I like this store MORE than El Super. Although, El Super has best pandulce hands down. This place very close second. I tried the carnitas burrito, pretty decent. Didn’t mess with tummy either. Whenever I visit my friends in Orange next, I will stop by :)

When I want to remind myself of how Mexican I am I go to La Carreta for my weekly grocery shopping. Let me tell you I am pretty Mexican because I shop here every week. They have awesome deals on produce 4lbs of bananas for $ 1.50, 5lbs of yams for $ 1.99. Now you ask who really needs 5lbs of yams? When you are Mexican and have a large Mexican family you do need that many yams to make camotes con piloncillo (which they conveniently market next to the yams).
Their staff is very friendly, attentive and will help you find what you are looking for. They have a Cocina where they have freshly made tacos, carne, pollo asado and then they have a bakery complete with a huge selection of tres leches cakes for all those Quinceneras, bautisos, bodas and whatever else us Mexicans always celebrate.
Now I keep emphasizing on the Mexican part because it is a very ethnic store. Some of the staff has limited English but will still go above and beyond to assist you in your grocery shopping needs.

I took a quick jaunt here last weekend to see my options in my new neighborhood. I was satisfied an happy to find a couple Mexican markets nearby. I needed a couple things from La Carreta to complete the evenings BBQ.
One could easily get lost among the fresh, handmade tortillas and carne. I love that La Carreta is huge and clean. I’ll probably do my regular shopping here seeing as they really have everything that a chain grocery store has plus a Cocina with cooked meats. I grabbed a pound of costillas to have for lunch. They were good but they don’t compare to the ones from El Toro in Santa Ana.
One thing I really needed was a comal to heat my tortillas. La Carreta didn’t really have one, just a small griddle and some large pots for stews and beans. Oh well, I’ll just hit up La Mirada swap meet for that.
Since I was in and out pretty quickly, I didn’t get to explore other areas like the produce. Next time I will and I’ll also grab some carnitas and chicharrones.

Great place to buy your produce for salsa and the carneasada was great

Muy fantastico!
I love this store! It is a great place to shop for Mexican ingredients, grocery products & housewares. The prices are cheap. The produce is of mixed quality (from great to kinda bad) but at the very reasonable prices they offer, its worth a stop.
The atmosphere is what it is. The store is pretty large and there is plenty of parking. Its not the newest or most sparkly looking shop but that’s not really what you’re there for. Service is fine. No complaints here.
The prepared food and bakery items are above average. Good stop for affordable & tasty carnitas, fresh tortillas, and sweet treats.
Pros: Open pretty late on weeknights, lots of parking, easy to access location, tortillas and tortilla chips, fulfills the pan dulce craving, prices, cheap housewares
Cons: Tend to be out of prepared foods by the evening, some of the produce is not the greatest
Overall great stop for grocery shopping or cheap, fast meals.

They have a good selection of Mexican groceries, obviously.
Fresh tortillas, sopes, masa, chips
Fresh salsa bar
Cheeses
Butcher/​seafood/​marinated meats
Mexican bakery
Herbs/​spices/​chiles
Produce
Flowers
Shoes?!
To-​go food bar

Awesome mercado within minutes of my sister’s place. Fresh made corn tortillas on site, at least a dozen of fresh salsas, tons of marinaded pork/​chicken/​beef ready for the grill, and extremely cheap produce. I highly suggest coming early in the morning to get the freshest items as they run out later on in the day of all of the good stuff.

The guacamole and salsas are as good as it gets. They also carry baked (low-​fat) tostadas that I love to eat with the shrimp ceviche they sell.
Like others mentioned the produce is dirt cheap but can also be pretty bad. Just make sure you inspect every piece of fruit or veggies you are buying.

We were feeling adventurous on Sunday and looking for something to do and out of the blue, we decided to see where El Toro Road would take us, we know that if you take it in one direction it’ll end up at Laguna Beach but where does it take you in the other direction? So we decided to try it out and lo and behold, El Toro turns into Santiago Canyon which turns into Chapman and before you know it you’re in the city of Orange.
As I watched in amazement, I also noticed another La Carreta location. A few months ago, I had visited the location in Anaheim thinking that was the only closest place for cheap sweet bread but hey, I can now head up El Toro for 15 minutes and it’s about a $ 1 more but with more varieties.
This grocery store is pretty fantastic. I’ve never seen such cheap prices for produce; it’s practically a steal and everything is made fresh daily — everything from salsa, tortilla, tortilla chips, baked goods, etc. You can smell it as you walk in.
I came in for my sweet bread fix and loaded up on the pinwheels, horns, and this pound cake like cupcake that almost looks like corn bread but it’s not. I got 9 pieces for $ 4. That would have cost me a lot more at Efren’s in Lake Forest since it’s a little more pricier there.
I just got my sweet bread on Sunday and it’s almost all gone but I know I’ll be back since it’s not too far off of El Toro. I love this shop but parking is a little tricky here since the white lines have all but disappeared and the rest is sort of in shambles and people just haphazardly park in whatever direction they want to which makes it weird. You can park near the cell phone stores where the parking situation is a little better and walk over.

This is a great place to shop for people who are on a budget, but really, this is a great place to shop full stop.
There are bargains galore to be had here, but that’s not really why I go. I really like the fresh meats, and the carne asada is great. You can get it from the butcher’s counter marinated or not, both are good. They also have these pork chops that are marinated in some sort of red spicy sauce, I’m a big fan of those.
They also have a whole deli counter with mainly different varieties of Mexican cheese, and a hot food section.
All sorts of packaged food too, and a full assortment of produce. The produce is a bit questionable, but its always cheap. With that being said, I usually go elsewhere for fresh fruits and veggies, but I do buy hot peppers here.
They bake their own fresh bread and tortillas too. Those tortillas are really good.
Great place to go to get all the ingredients for a wonderful homemade mexican dinner!