Category Archives: bakery

Hellenic Bakery and Cakes, Marrickville

bakery, city, nsw, vanilla slice

371 Illawarra Rd, Marrickville, New South Wales
www.hellenicbakerymarrickville.com.au

I was on my way home from a business function in an unfamiliar neighbourhood when I stumbled across Hellenic Bakery and Cakes, just a stone’s throw from Marrickville railway station. Peering into the unlikely looking 1990s semi-brutalist concrete exterior, I discovered an Aladdin’s cave of wondrous treasures.

Hellenic Bakery

Mounds of Greek pastries and cakes filled display counters that rose above eye level on three sides of the dimly lit store: baklava, kataifi, poura, galaktobouriko, Greek shortbread. Amongst these are more diverse wares: cannoli, eclairs, macarons, lamingtons, tiramisu, tarts, and all manner of cakes. In the centre of the room was a table laden heavily with freshly baked bread and buns. Anything and everything looked incredibly tempting, but my eyes fell upon a golden radiance emanating from one corner of this treasure pile. A tray of humble vanilla slices beckoned, promising release of the genie of deliciousness if I would but rub some coins in my pocket and hand them over to the elderly Greek woman who was tending the counter.

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The Cake Man, Lane Cove

bakery, cafe, city, nsw, sausage roll, vanilla slice,

Shop 5A, 23-25 Burns Bay Rd, Lane Cove NSW
www.thecakeman.com.au

2016-02-28_01-57-52

Looking up a local bakery to go for lunch, I had originally intended to go to The Pottery Green bakery at Lane Cove. Upon arriving, they didn’t have any vanilla slices, so I went for a walk and found The Cake Man instead. This is a place occupying both sides of an entire arcade between the pedestrian mall and the parking lot at Lane Cove, a locality in the northern suburbs of Sydney. They have a take-away cafe with a few dining tables, a separate fancy cake shop, a restaurant and wine bar, plus their actual bakery and kitchens at this location.

The sausage roll and vanilla slice were described exactly thus by little plaques in the display cabinet and pie warmer – although there was also a “caramelised mille feuille” which looked tempting. The server requested I took a seat at the tables outside, and the items were bought out to me on little plates with serviettes and cutlery.

The Cake Man

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Piccolo Deli, Mount Victoria

bakery, cafe, country, nsw, sausage roll

30 Station St, Mount Victoria, New South Wales

A leisurely Sunday drive up into the Blue Mountains west of Sydney for a day out provided the opportunity to sample bakery products from a bit further afield. We stopped for morning tea at Leura, having a Devonshire tea of scones hot from the oven (they had literally taken them out just minutes before serving them to us), with home made strawberry jam and double cream. The scones were chocolate chip and cranberry, which made things even more decadent. After spending some time in Katoomba, we found ourselves in Mount Victoria when lunch hunger hit. So we parked in this small mountain town and walked to the Piccolo Deli, which also serves as a cafe.

Piccolo Deli

In the display counter were various pastries, both savoury and sweet. They had two types of sausage rolls: beef and onion, and pork and fennel, as well as a vegetable roll for the meat-free. A few rolls were hot in a pie warmer, but the friendly woman behind the counter said they could heat up anything for eating. Naturally, I ordered one of each of the sausage rolls, while Mrs SB&R chose the vege roll.

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Rustique, Mosman

bakery, cafe, city, nsw, sausage roll

920 Military Road, Mosman, New South Wales

I’d taken a Wednesday off work, and decided to head out for lunch. I took a drive to the suburb of Mosman, which has a long main street with dozens of shops and cafes. Unfortunately my first choice for lunch had just sold out of sausage rolls when I arrived – the man immediately before me had bought the last two! So I wandered in search of another bakery for my lunch.

Rustique

I found Rustique, sitting on the corner of Military Road and Raglan Street. The sign proclaimed it to be a “bakery patisserie cafe”, which sounds good. Mosman being a posh suburb, I expected it to be a bit fancy inside, but it was very standard bakery-cafe sort of decor, a bit tired looking even, as though overdue for a renovation. Furthermore, even though there was a fairly large selection of cakes, they didn’t have a vanilla slice! I decided to try a sausage roll and a pie, and seek a slice elsewhere.

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The Brooky Pie, Brookvale

bakery, city, nsw, sausage roll

650 Pittwater Rd, Brookvale, New South Wales
www.thebrookypie.com

The Brooky Pie is a small family-run business with a single pie shop on the busy Pittwater Road just north of the vast Warringah Mall shopping centre. The pies are lovingly hand made in a traditional fashion, and they also have a vegetable pastie and a sausage roll. There are a handful of sweets on the menu, including an apple pie, custard tart, and caramel slice, but alas no vanilla slice.

The Brooky Pie

Nevertheless, being in the area at lunchtime one day I ventured in to sample the savoury wares. I selected a pie and one of the sausage rolls.

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Dinky-Di Pies & Pastries, Pyrmont

bakery, cafe, city, nsw, sausage roll,

35 Union Street, Pyrmont, New South Wales

I found this place on a day walk around Sydney Harbour, following the Seven Bridges route. With “Pies & Pastries” in the name, this had to be a good place for finding material for this blog. Unfortunately, on the day when I first spotted it, I had just had lunch a few minutes earlier, at a place a block away, so I had to make an excursion to return on another day and sample the wares.

Dinky Di Pies & Pastries

I assumed they would have a vanilla slice as one of the advertised pastries, but upon entering the establishment I discovered that they had more varieties of pies and sausage rolls than sweet baked goods, and that the pastries didn’t include a vanilla slice. I asked if they made them and perhaps rotated their selection from day to day, but the lady behind the counter said they only made the ones currently on display. Nevertheless, I’d made the trip specially, and they certainly had sausage rolls. Not just one, but two different varieties: beef, and lamb and rosemary.

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The Flaky Tart, redux, Kirribilli

bakery, city, nsw, sausage roll, vanilla slice,

4 Ennis Rd, Kirribilli, New South Wales

In a first for Snot Block & Roll, this is a re-review! Mr Coker wrote up his original review of The Flaky Tart bakery in Kirribilli some time ago. As the review was very good and the bakery is not too far away, I decided to sample the wares myself. And then I figured why not write up my own conclusions!

The Flaky Tart

A bit of research reveals that The Flaky Tart is not a one-off shop here under the Harbour Bridge at Kirribilli, but is actually a branch of the better known Flaky Tart bakery of Rose Bay, on the south side of the harbour. Perhaps I’ll have to travel over there one day to sample its wares as well.

But on this fine sunny day in Kirribilli, I purchased a sausage roll, vanilla slice, and because I was very hungry, also a chicken and mushroom pie. I found a wooden bench seat nearby, perched on the side of the steeply sloping Ennis Road, overlooking the shops and restaurants of Broughton Street below. As I sat, an inquisitive seagull appeared – perhaps the very same gull that eyed Mr Coker’s samples in the previous review!

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Cammeray Cakes, Cammeray

bakery, city, nsw, sausage roll, vanilla slice,

443 Miller Street, Cammeray, New South Wales

This is an old-fashioned bakery on the main street of Cammeray, in a somewhat run-down shopfront building with a rusting steel awning over it. It seems to have at least two identities, as the signage outside calls it the very descriptive and down-to-earth “Cammeray Cakes”, but once inside there are posters stuck up proclaiming the premises to be “Le Martin Patisserie”.

Cammeray Cakes

Whatever the place is called, it’s a small, locally run bakery staffed by a couple of friendly Vietnamese ladies. They do some Vietnamese treats like pork rolls, as well as the usual staples of Australian bakeries. I ordered my sausage roll and vanilla slice and took them out to the nearby shopping plaza across the road to find a seat and eat them.

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St Leonards Bread & Cakes, St Leonards

bakery, city, nsw, sausage roll, vanilla slice,

28 Pacific Highway, St Leonards, New South Wales

This is a mostly anonymous hole-in-the-wall bakery on the heavy traffic road of the Pacific Highway as it cuts through the suburb of St Leonards. It’s so anonymous that the signage can’t even seem to decide if it’s called “St Leonards Bread & Cakes” or “St Leonards Pies & Cakes”. The shops fronting the major bus stop here have a gritty, run-down feel, with traces of graffiti on the walls, and this place is no exception. It’s operated by a Vietnamese family, and so naturally the French style bread hot from the oven is delightfully soft in the middle and crusty on the outside. They offer a fresh hand-made Vietnamese pork roll, which seems popular, as well as a range of the usual standards.

St Leonards Bread & Cakes

I secured a sausage roll for $2,70 and a vanilla slice for $3. Being no places to sit in the immediate vicinity, I walked 50 metres or so to the nearest intersection, where a blocked off side street offers a tiny refuge from the traffic with a couple of bench seats.

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St Ives Bakehouse Cafe, St Ives

bakery, city, nsw, sausage roll, vanilla slice,

St Ives Shopping Village, Shop 67, 166 Mona Vale Road, St Ives, New South Wales
stivesvillage.com.au/bakehouse-cafe-st-ives/

I made my way to the northern Sydney suburb of St Ives in search of La Petite Lorraine, a bakery which appears frequently when Googling “best vanilla slice in Sydney”. Its name jumped out of the web page so many times that I had to make the pilgrimage. Alas, when I arrived, La Petitie Lorraine was nowhere to be found, even with the help of Google Maps telling me that I was standing less than 5 metres from its location.

Assuming there was some location error, or that the place had closed, I sought refuge from the burning sunshine inside the St Ives Shopping Village – which is really just a mid-sized indoor shopping centre. There were a couple of bakeries in there, and I located one which had both sausage rolls and vanilla slices: the Bakehouse Cafe. Despite the “Cafe” in its name, it was really just a bakery counter front, with no tables or service other than two women behind the cash register selling the baked goods.

Bakehouse Cafe

I procured the roll and slice, and then with no nearby seating available, walked the length of the shopping centre to the food court area to find a table. (Mrs Snot Block & Roll acquired a date scone, which was large and chunky, and declared it to be quite good.) Sitting down, I began examining the sausage roll, which had been packaged in a brown paper bag emblazoned with the logo of the Bakehouse Cafe.

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