Baker­ies where you can find glu­ten­free products on São Miguel Island – Part 1

Based on my exper­i­ence every city or region on Sao Miguel Island has a sig­na­ture baked good. I am plan­ning to write a post later which intro­duces all these baked good­ies. How­ever, almost all of these products are glu­ten­ous. This is why I have decided to vis­it every bakery and patis­ser­ie in the area to ask about gluten-free options, thus help­ing fel­low trav­el­ers. To my abso­lute delight I have stumbled upon the per­fect place in Fur­nas: the Bakery of Glor­ia Moniz.

The Glor­ia Mon­iz bakery is also very spe­cial because it sells the best Bolos Leve­dos (Por­tuguese sweet bread) in town. Com­pared with sim­il­ar products of oth­er baker­ies, the Bolos Leve­dos of Glor­ia Mon­iz have a rich­er and heav­ier pastry. I will tell more about the Bolos Leve­dos in an upcom­ing post.The bakery is a little dif­fi­cult to find, since it is tucked away at the back of a court­yard. At the gate – which resembles a drive­way there is a small sign with „Bolos Leve­dos” and the name of the bakery „Glor­ia Mon­iz” is painted on the pave­ment out­side. Loc­als flock here every morn­ing to get their break­fast Bolos Leve­dos to go, or to enjoy it there imme­di­ately.
Bolos Leve­dos is a sweet bread, but it is used for savoury dishes and even as bur­ger bun. Since it is made from plain flour and act­ive yeast I only dared to take a tiny bite – but I liked it very much, and would recom­mend for you to try it, too. Also for people with no glu­ten and lactose intol­er­ance the Maracuja Cake is a must!

But let me get back to my ori­gin­al top­ic: the gluten-free cakes of the Azores.
A very friendly sales assist­ant at Glor­ia Mon­iz – who now recog­nizes me and knows my to-go order – told me to try this Azorean bean tart. 

The Quei­jadas de Feijão (bean tart) is a brown colored, gluten-free tart made of mashed beans and almond flour. It is simply divine. [galer­ia 10]
As inspir­a­tion, I took a few pic­tures of the bakery.
My friends all agree that the cof­fee sold at the bakery is also fant­ast­ic (this is some­thing that I, being a BIO Girl and a no-coffee drink­er can­not veri­fy, but I am happy to share my friends’ feedback).

Where is Glor­ia Mon­iz Bakery in Fur­nas? Click here

For those of you who are not plan­ning a trip to the Azores yet, but would like to try the Quei­jadas de Feijão (bean tart) I have found a recipe here. I am look­ing for­ward to your feed­back and pic­tures, if you decide to make it yourselves!