Cheese-showered pastries, dulce de leche vanilla slices and buttery, flaky almond croissants are just some of the baked goods you’ll find in Good Food’s 100 Essential Melbourne Cafes and Bakeries guide.
Good Food Guide reviewers
If there’s one thing Melburnians love to queue for, it’s baked goods – sweet, savoury, stuffed with custard, dusted with cheese; if it’s fresh from the oven, the crowds come running. From Huntingdale to Delahey, these 20 spots are our favourites for sourdough loaves, crisp laminated pastries, topped focaccia and gooey cookies. The only downside? Deciding what to order once you reach the counter.
A1 Bakery
It might feel chaotic, but that’s part of the charm of A1, a bustling Sydney Road mainstay since 1997. Thanks to a devoted following, this family-run Lebanese bakery has since expanded to Fitzroy and Highpoint. At the original, bakers churn out freshly kneaded flatbread all day. They’re an absolute steal, starting at $2.50 for a herbaceous zaatar pizza bigger than your head. Breakfast platters make for a more substantial dine-in brunch, while wraps brimming with house dips and falafel or lamb kofta are quickly snapped up. Before you leave, hit the grocery section for jars of Middle Eastern pickles and pantry staples.
Must order: Molten halloumi cheese pies ($6) are a crowd favourite.
643-645 Sydney Road, Brunswick, a1bakery.com.au
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Bakemono
The often lengthy queue snaking down Drewery Lane – a bluestone laneway just off Little Lonsdale Street – is worth joining. At the end lie pastries from a tiny Japanese-inspired bakery. Shoji-style timber frames are found throughout, including on the large window that allows eager customers to peep at the pastry kitchen before entering. Specialty treats include custardy caneles (pick from Earl Grey, rum-vanilla and matcha) while buttery shio pan salt bread and various Danishes and croissants make regular appearances.
Must order: Any of the croissants – crunchy on the outside, delicate and soft inside, and last year ranked in the top five in Good Food’s croissant taste test.
273 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, bakemonobakers.com.au
Baker Bleu
If you’re a fiend for baked goods, you’re likely no stranger to this bakery group, known for its sourdough, bagels and dark-crusted loaves. Staying true to the ethos of working with local producers, Baker Bleu’s fourth Melbourne store – opposite the Royal Botanic Gardens – offers the full range of bread and pastries, plus seasonal specials. In a first for the bakery, soft serve is also available in a different flavour every month.
Must order: Rosso peperonata, a focaccia topped with stracciatella and house- made basil and walnut pesto, plus the rotating soft serve.
183 Domain Road, South Yarra, bakerbleu.com.au
Beurre
This cheerful sweet shop delivers a hit of dopamine before you’ve even reached the counter. Murals, colourful tiles and touches of gingham are as bright and playful as the display of cheesecakes, tarts, pastries and towering layer cakes. Some draw on owner Zahara Valibhoy’s Singaporean-Pakistani heritage, and all – as the name suggests – are made with real butter rather than buttery substitutes.
Must order: Battenberg cake – a checkerboard of vanilla and pandan sponge layered with raspberry jam and wrapped in marzipan.
129 Mailing Road, Canterbury, beurre.com.au
Butter Days
Helmed by chef and baker John Demetrios (ex-Vue de Monde, Omnia), Butter Days brings bright, Scandi-inspired energy to Malvern. The airy, open-plan space flows from a communal front table to a pastry showcase, straight back to a massive marble baking bench. Echoing its sunny logo, the signature sunshine bun − a sweet, round pastry with a golden custard centre – will put a smile on your dial.
Must-order dish: The BMO − “bolle med ost” (bun with cheese in Danish) − a sourdough roll filled with slices of gruyere and biteable butter.
209 Glenferrie Road, Malvern, butterdaysbakery.com.au
Candied Bakery
This westside favourite marks a baker’s dozen years, but they’re not loafing around. The cake cabinet’s an enticing mix of cult hits and new tricks, including gooey cinnamon scrolls perfected over 11 years. A pegboard displays the daily bread (slicing is offered with a smile) or snag a sausage roll − perhaps sweet, juicy char siu pork. The same puff pastry perches atop a vanilla slice doughnut, a hat-tip to the original.
Good to know: Open for a pre- or post-Scienceworks pit stop.
136 Hall Street, Spotswood, candiedbakery.com.au
Creme de la Creme
What began in baker Jasmin Jammal Ladkani’s home kitchen has blossomed into a beloved neighbourhood favourite. Here, patisserie draws inspiration from her Lebanese heritage and the broader Middle Eastern and Mediterranean region. The “Balkan triangle” pairs ajvar paste’s spiced capsicum notes with halloumi, wrapped in delicate strands of laminated pastry. There are also cinnamon scrolls, cookies and cakes – all halal and baked in-house.
Must order: The knafeh croissant takes the best parts of the sweet and cheese-filled Levantine dessert and translates it into a handheld pastry.
Unit 1, 101 Hudsons Road, Spotswood, cdlcpatisserie.com.au
Daybaker
He worked at Tivoli Road Bakery, then spent five years at Small Batch coffee roastery. Now Charlie Duffy has a polished stage for his precisely formed pastries. Long-fermented dough drapes like fabric over the pork-and-fennel-seed filling of a sausage roll. Ham and cheese croissants are perked up with fermented green tomato, and a roasted broccolini sandwich gets a deli cabinet glow-up from fat green olives and capsicum-tomato pesto.
Must-order: Bomba Calabrese, a savoury pastry smeared with salty Italian chilli paste and finished with whipped ricotta.
66 Nicholson Street, Abbotsford, daybaker.com.au
Dulce Bakehouse
Some quests are endless. Others – such as the search for the perfect vanilla slice – end right here in Melbourne’s north-western suburbs. This South American bakery nails Aussie high-street classics and delicate French pastries but the empanadas are non-negotiable. The beef version is filled with braised, paprika-spiced topside wrapped in lard pastry, along with the quirky traditional Chilean inclusions of one black olive, two sultanas and a slice of boiled egg. Whatever you land on, you’re unlikely to strike any duds.
Must order: The bestselling vanilla slice: the bottom layer is spread with dulce de leche, the rich milk caramel cutting the slice’s creamy sweetness with a touch of bitterness and tang.
Unit 8, 350 Taylors Road, Delahey, dulcebakehouse.com.au
Elka Bakery
This sleek concrete-and-timber bakery is pure salvation for Heidelberg’s medical crowd. Arrive early – Elka’s pristine glass cases are quickly plundered of their contents, such as house-baked focaccia loaded with mortadella, rocket, pistachio pesto and a kick of hot honey. Or classic, crunchy baguettes packed with ham, cheese and pickles. Wash it down with a San Pedro coffee for when you need a shot of caffeine, stat. Also in Essendon, Moonee Ponds and Templestowe.
Must order: Pillowy cinnamon scrolls feature mellow spicing and drippy vanilla and cream cheese icing.
120 Burgundy Street, Heidelberg, instagram.com/elkabakerymelb
Falco
Few bakeries can claim so many slam dunks: a chicken sandwich that’s in the city’s top 10, a peanut butter-miso cookie that nails crisp-chewy, top-tier sausage rolls and pies (go classic with steak and pepper, or chaos mode with cheeseburger). Sweet pastries are gorgeous and glossy, baked just the right side of dark, and bread is hearty yet still reasonably priced. A true all-rounder bakery.
Good to know: Pies and sausage rolls are also sold frozen to bake at home.
288 Smith Street, Collingwood, falcobakery.com
The Flour House
There’s plenty of pastry wizardry on display in 2026, but how many bakeries mill their own flour? Crackle-crusted loaves range from sprouted wheat with sesame to wand-shaped tordu flecked with confit garlic and mozzarella. Flaky, buttery pastries span the sweet – white choc-raspberry squiggles – and the savoury, headlined by hefty cups of egg, bacon, cheese and kasoundi. Also in Hampton.
Good to know: The Highett HQ includes a cafe serving hot-from-the-oven pastries, croques-monsieurs and crisp buckwheat flatbreads topped with ham, egg and cheese.
3 Graham Road, Highett, theflourhouse.com.au
Gordon St Bakery
You might think you’ve been undercharged. But it’s just rare to find bakes this refined for prices this reasonable. Rum-spiked frangipane made the $6.50 almond croissant famous at this French bakery’s original Footscray location. Now, bakers deliver sourdough and viennoiserie multiple times a day to a second grab-and-go shopfront in Ascot Vale. A salty suggestion: the cheese “stick”, made of hol(e)y, honeycomb-look pastry.
Good to know: The Ascot Vale offshoot doesn’t do coffee, but you can caffeinate at nearby Elka Bakery (and pick up more pastries, see above, thanks to Gordon St’s bargain prices).
142 Gordon Street, Footscray; 175 Union Road, Ascot Vale; gordonstbakery.com
Little Sister Bakery
Jewish baking meets Middle Eastern flavours at this tiny takeaway space in Elsternwick where locals are greeted by name, hand-stretched focaccia is sold warm from the oven, and the aroma of chewy zaatar twists permeates the room. Scrolls and cookies are steady favourites, but the rugelach — pastry twisted babka-style with gooey chocolate — stands out. Also in Chadstone, South Yarra, Malvern, Caulfield and McKinnon.
Must order: Chocolate rugelach.
260 Glen Eira Road, Elsternwick, littlesisterbakery.com.au
Maison Arnaud
Why settle for a classic egg and bacon roll when you can have it in a chewy baguette? Maison Arnaud feels like a proper old-school French boulangerie tucked into suburban Melbourne. Cabinets are filled with pastries baked fresh each morning, shelves are stacked with fermented sourdough and service is warm without fuss. Drop in for a grab-and-go brekkie on your morning commute.
Must order: Almond croissant, with a gooey almond filling sealed in a caramelised base.
304 Huntingdale Road, Huntingdale, maisonarnaud.com.au
Penny for Pound
This giant bakery-cafe is a beacon for sweet tooths. Ogle through floor-to-ceiling windows at croissants being filled with almond frangipane and tangy blueberry jam as you ponder your selection. The orange-poppyseed escargot is so zesty it’s like bathing in citrus, while cracking through the chocolate glaze of a peanut butter cup cruffin to reveal its oozing salty-sweet centre almost feels illegal.
Good to know: Nab a pack of pre-made croissants or pain au chocolat to bake at home and impress your friends.
7 Cochranes Road, Moorabbin, pennyforpound.com.au
To Be Frank
Following the closure of its Elsternwick outpost, Collingwood favourite To Be Frank has brought its baked goods to East Brunswick Village. At the new architecturally designed bakery, watch the magic of pastry lamination, rolling and piping through the window of a light-filled open pastry kitchen. Crowd-pleasers include baguettes, fruit loaves, focaccia and deli-style sangers.
Must order: The coconut dulce de leche bomb that nods to co-owner Franco Villalva’s Argentinian roots.
3 Village Avenue, Brunswick East, tobefrankbakery.com.au
Urbanstead
Perch at the communal table in this light-filled corner bakery long enough, and you’re bound to end up swapping gardening tips, catching up on neighbourhood news or trading recipes. Locals come for the community vibe but stay for the exceptional and ever-changing baked goods – from hand pies plump with silverbeet and ricotta and organic sourdough loaves to seasonal fruit danishes, a fleeting taste of peak produce captured in buttery pastry.
Good to know: Owners Michael and Pippa James offer regular classes sharing their biscuit, bread and pastry wisdom.
203 Langridge Street, Abbotsford, urbanstead.au
Vandels
Chef Shaun Quade (ex-Lume) and his partner, Veronica Fil, opened their timber-trimmed bakery in June and quickly earned a legion of hungry fans. Pies with soaring puff pastry lids (made with Lard Ass butter) are bestsellers. They might be filled with lamb shank, confit garlic and potato, or chicken in a mustard-cream sauce. Quade’s finely trained palate amps up everything from a simple pork-and-fennel sausage roll to a salted chocolate cookie made with nutty buckwheat and malted barley flour.
Good to know: Their pies are in hot demand so aim for an early visit. Right nearby, Ovens Street Bakery keeps the momentum going with legendary sausage rolls, well-priced loaves and danishes.
446 Sydney Road, Brunswick, vandelsbakery.com
Zelda
Fun-sized and dynamic, this shop does not stop. Its window is stacked high with cheese and jalapeno pretzels, sour cream coffee crumble cake, challah sandwiches and babka braided with rich chocolate or herbed butter. Toss in apple hand pies, spiced bear bostocks and bear claws, and decision paralysis is guaranteed – a situation made all the more urgent by the fact that Zelda opens just two days a week. Our advice? Arrive early, leave logic at the door and buy one of everything.
Must order: The traditional croissant – a feathery, buttery thing – took out top spot in Good Food’s 2025 blind taste-test.
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