Elizabeth Brooks, 73; Owner of Westwood’s Butterfly Bakery

Elizabeth Androyan Brooks, 73, who rose at 3:30 a.m. six days a week for more than 30 years to bake goods for her Butterfly Bakery and Deli in Westwood, died Friday at UCLA Medical Center of complications from a stroke three days earlier.

Brooks, a professionally trained baker, and her late husband, Ted, opened the business in 1973. The establishment became a regular morning coffee and pastry stop for Westsiders, from ordinary folks to such celebrities as Barbra Streisand, Nancy and Ronald Reagan, Elizabeth Taylor, Sidney Poitier, Julie Andrews, Michael Jackson, Dolly Parton, Madonna and Aaron Spelling.

The rich and famous were as welcome behind the counter as in front of it. Golf’s U.S. Open champion Amy Alcott put on an apron and chef’s hat and made sandwiches. She even designed one for Brooks, the Alcott Hole in One -- a fried egg in a croissant with Swiss cheese, tomato, Dijon mustard and alfalfa sprouts.

When new owners sharply increased Brooks’ rent a year or so ago, customers rallied to help. Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad even wrote a letter, calling the bakery a “Westwood institution” and insisting that “our neighborhood just wouldn’t be the same without it.” Nevertheless, Brooks was forced to close shop in January.