{"id":90216,"date":"2026-10-15T14:29:41","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T21:29:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/?p=90216"},"modified":"2026-10-15T15:49:39","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T22:49:39","slug":"little-arellano-farm-westside-free-range-eggs-and-sourdough-bakery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/eat-see-do-2\/eat\/little-arellano-farm-westside-free-range-eggs-and-sourdough-bakery","title":{"rendered":"A Westside baker is feeding her community with backyard crops, free-range eggs and fresh sourdough"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s said that chickens are considered a gateway drug within the homesteading community: One chicken can lead to a farming addiction. And that was certainly the case for 34-year-old Alyssa Arellano. It started with a couple of chickens and a small garden in the backyard of her Westside home during the pandemic. Now she runs a small-scale farm and sourdough microbakery called Little Arellano Farm<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In her 4,000-square-foot backyard farm, Arellano grows a variety of fresh produce like tomatoes, jalape\u00f1os and onions. She also mills her own flour and raises 20 chickens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The chickens provide all the eggs she uses to bake her sourdough breads and pastries.\u00a0 Arellano raises a variety of chicken breeds because she says she enjoys collecting the different colored eggs they produce \u2014 like brown or blue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey’re like the millennial new-age Pokemon,\u201d she said. The three newest chickens in her coop are salmon faverolles, which are supposed to lay pink eggs. Those chickens are too young to lay yet, but Arellano is eager to see the eggs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Two chickens walk past each other while foraging through the garden at the Little Arellano Farm in the Westside neighborhood of Long Beach on Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. Owner Alyssa Arellano keeps 20 chickens and uses their eggs for her baking. Photo by Thomas R. Cordova.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Arellano grew up in San Pedro and the Central Valley. She started baking with her mom at 3 years old, sitting on the counter smashing bananas for banana bread to put in Christmas baskets. As the treats baked, Arellano said she and her mom would dance and sing in the kitchen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“That was like the best time of my life.\u201d  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But at 14, Arellano\u2019s father died suddenly from a heart attack, and baking became an outlet for her grief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arellano attended The New England Culinary Institute in Vermont at 17, worked her way through professional kitchens \u2013 including those of world-renowned bakers Thomas Keller and Wolfgang Puck \u2013 then eventually opened her own bakery in San Pedro (where Colossus<\/a> now stands).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Alyssa Arellano, owner of Little Arellano Farm, cuts a loaf of garlic sourdough bread she baked at her home bakery in Long Beach on Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026. Photo by Thomas R. Cordova.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

She and her husband \u2014 a lifelong Long Beach resident \u2014 moved to the Westside in 2019. They found the neighborhood welcoming and affordable. When she found out she was pregnant with her first child, Arellano decided to close her bakery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Four years later, after the birth of her third child, Arellano was hit hard with postpartum depression. Baking, once again, became a form of therapy for her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI needed something that felt like myself again,\u201d she said. She turned her focus to sourdough because it is easier to digest and has more nutrients than regular yeasted bread. She also loves the challenge of working with something that is \u201calive and very fluid.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen you see how beautiful the loaf is out of the oven, [that] is the best feeling,\u201d Arellano said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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