The contents of this blog are matters of opinion formed over one more visits. There has been some artistry applied and metaphors and similes should not necessarily be taken literally.
My mother wanted me to look at an apartment I couldn’t afford in Five Dock. We had pastries we couldn’t afford instead. Allow me to explain:
The Corn & Cheese ($7), true to its name, was an open pastry topped with corn and cheese. It gave a memory of pizza, what with its cheesiness and a slight hint of capsicum. The pastry was quite flaky and excellent.
The Vanilla Tart ($7) was really just fine. A bit runny, a bit fancy, what with its expensive black dots (included).
The Cherry Cream Cheese ($6.50) was the cheapest and my favourite of the bunch. Both my partner and I love a good sour cherry.
The Hot Dog Twist ($7.50) tasted lik esomething you could get for $3 from Breadtop but with laminated pastry. I don’t even particularly like those hot dog buns, don’t think I’ll be getting this again.
The Sticky Nuts ($7) I found to be unfortunately a bit too sweet and sticky for my taste, though I did very much enjoy the huge mountain of croissant dough underneath the caramelised sugared layer on top.
Overall thoughts I honestly didn’t know before going that this was a Korean bakery not that any of the items that we had was particularly Korean. Tenacious Bakehouse remains my S-class Korean pastry shop of Sydney. Maybe if we didn’t eat out so much we could actually afford to buy residential property.
Buttercrumbs Croissant Shop 1/189 Great N Rd, Five Dock NSW 2046 0421 339 389
Despite their small size and tiny amount of available seating, Azuki Bakery in Sydney’s inner west has some of my favourite pastries of recent times, incorporating mostly-Japanese but broadly East Asian flavours into a universally loved medium (bread).
We’ll start by talking about this Kimchi Pork Sausage Roll ($5.80). This Korean inspired sausage roll was the savoury highlight of our meal, with a good flaky pastry and a warm and flavourful meaty filling.
While I had great expectations for Azuki’s Beef Curry Pan ($5), this was unfortunately not quite the picture of perfection that I had hoped. I enjoyed the light and sweet bread and the crispy oily external layer, but sadly found that the internal filling was just a bit too cool for my liking. While it is true that we waited maybe five minutes for one of the three outdoor tables to free up (our prediction for which of the three Asian couples presently seated would leave first and be replaced by us, also an Asian couple, was completely wrong – the ones who had finished eating first actually ended up staying the longest to sit and chat), this bun was otherwise straight from their counter. It is a shame as I could tell that the filling would otherwise be pretty good, but was just lacking a bit of warmth to open up the flavours and aromas.
Azuki is not the first bakery to advertise its Hot Cross Bun ($4.20) as the best in Sydney, but to be honest my knowledge of hot cross buns is neither deep nor broad enough to dispute or support this claim. This particular hot cross bun was quite densely packed compared to your average supermarket variety, with a good amount of spice in the dough and a deliciously heavy load of fruit and walnuts. It was, all in all a good hot cross bun.
The Yuzu Doughnut ($5.20) was pretty good, not too sweet apart from the candied citrus slice on top. I enjoyed the soft dough and the mild but delicious yuzu custard cream within.
This Custard Puff ($4.80) came on its own in a little cake box, so you know it’s special. It had a strong Beard Papa energy, and I loved everything about this, from the sweet and buttery cookie choux pastry to the light and creamy vanilla custard filling. So good.
The Strawberry Extra Decoration Cake ($58), which I ordered for a family birthday based on our good experience with their other offerings was sadly not as exciting as the rest. It was a fairly basic sponge cake with an interior layer of strawberry, and in my personal opinion too much whipped cream. It did not stand out as a cake against competitor cakes. At least it was not too sweet.
THOUGHTS
We tried and liked a great number of things from Azuki, but the one dessert I think you can’t walk past is their excellent custard puff. We’ll definitely be going back for another, along with some other things.
After waiting in line in the rain for 45 minutes outside Lune, I decided to better use what limited time I have on this Earth and eat somewhere else instead. Agathé Pâtisserie, at the South Melbourne Markets (at the time of writing only open Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday), is a French bakery at least equal to Lune, without the ridiculous social media hype and resultant line.
I really enjoyed this Pandan Croissant ($8). It was sweet, but not too sweet, with a pandan flavour that did not overpower. The pastry was as perfect as any croissant I’ve ever had, fluffy and pillowy on the inside with a good crunchy crust on the outside. Even the physical act of tearing this croissant apart in my hands was pleasurable, with crinkling of crust an almost ASMR like experience. This was instantly one of the best croissants I’ve ever had.
My partner chose this mushroom puff ($7), a savoury pastry of mushroom, onion, bechamel and thyme. It was not bad, again demonstrating good puff pastry qualities, but I did feel that the temperature was not right for what it was. The addition of a bit more heat to soften the toppings would’ve been ideal.
This peach perfect tart was in fact quite perfect. I don’t even know what the words “fresh peach and compote on a breton biscuit topped by lemon myrtle and vanilla chantilly” but I can tell you that it was delicious, and importantly not too sweet. It even came in a nice little cake box, which was wasted on us as we promptly sat down next to the store (in front of a guy selling roasted nuts, who gave us some free nuts to try) and scoffed it down. Yum.
So after we left Agathe and did half a round of the South Melbourne Markets I went back and got this Kougin-Amann ($7), a sweet and extremely buttery croissant-like cake that by tradition is 30% butter and 30% sugar. Delicious but perhaps still secondary to their croissants.
OVERALL: I really think that Agathe takes the cake when it comes to French patisserie in Melbourne. Lune diehards are welcome to wait in line for an hour in the pouring rain while cultured Agathé fans munch on a deliciously buttery croissant, Tuesday to Friday at their CBD store and Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at the South Melbourne Markets.
Agathé Pâtisserie South Melbourne Markets – 322 Coventry St, South Melbourne VIC 3205 0403 222 573
It was a true crime that I was only allowed to try two things at Bakemono, because both things were good and there was therefore a high likelihood that any third thing would’ve been good as well.
This blueberry & custarddanish ($7) was just delicious, with a large heaping of juicy blueberries and just the right amount of sweetness in the custard and pastry to put it into the prime zone. The soft custard, crispy exterior pastry and cloud-like interior pastry all conspired to make a great little treat.
The honey, sesame, and sea salt scroll ($4.50) was also good, though not as perfect as the above mentioned danish. I enjoyed the sweet and sticky honey coating, which had a distinctly Korean feel to it, especially together with the sesame seeds. Though honeyed, the good combination of sweetness and saltiness makes this a scroll not merely for dessert fans, but all bread fans in general.
OVERALL With only a little bench outside for seating, Bakemono serves up delicious little pastries with a Korean and Japanese inspiration without the long wait of a certain Fitzroy-based bakery. Though their selection is limited, I would definitely suggest this place as worth a little swing-by for bready breakfast, maybe to be eaten on the State Library lawn.
I’ve been trying to arrange an all-purpose wedding and interview suit for a few weeks now, a process that has involved several trips into the city, with at least one more to come. On my first trip into the big smoke I wanted to try one of Yeongjin Park’s (ex-Lode) famous pastries at Picco Leo, however arrived there only to find that he had left the previous week, with his specialties off the menu and probably never to return. It was a dark period for the pastry community, with us adherents left in limbo as he moved his operation from the CBD to his new Darlinghurst digs, Tenacious Bakehouse.
I was able to visit Tenacious Bakehouse as a bit of a sidequest from my second of three attendances at SuitSupply. Incredibly small and nondescript, I actually walked past it and around the block through some garbage-smelling alleys before I was able to find what I was looking for.
This Portuguese Tart ($12) was the only thing that I knew I wanted before I went. I’m generally someone who enjoys a Portuguese tart, and this had come highly recommended by some of the city’s top pastryheads (though not the top pastryhead, who I believe is yet to go). Tenacious Bakehouse’s Portuguese Tart has a super-crispy multi-layered pastry, with a deep cup accommodating a huge mass of runny eggy custard. The egg custard filling was softer and runnier than your usual pastel de nata, but not to its detriment, just different. It was not too sweet, one of the defining positive characteristics of any Asian-influenced dessert or pastry. While I enjoyed the unexpected crispiness of the pastry, I did feel that the pastry got a bit bitter towards the edges. It’s certainly baked to a dark brown, as you can see from the photos, and I think probably a little darker than most normal food is baked. Was the pastry a bit burnt? Was it a bit of over-enthusiastic caramelisation? Was it completely intentional? I don’t know, I’m not an expert. Either way, it was easily overlookable, and didn’t really detract from the overall positive experience.
The Pork Mandu ($10) was actually very good. It was like a three-way cross between a croissant, one of those Maltese pastizzi things filled with ricotta and spinach from the freezer aisle at the supermarket, and a Chinese pork bun. (Understanding totally that this is a Korean bakery with Korean staff and literally told to be to be Korean in inspiration by the very nice Korean woman manning the counter, I just haven’t had that many mandus in my time to reference back to, and none that have tasted like this). The pastry here was absolutely top tier, soft, flaky, delicate, oily, and buttery. There was no suspicion of burning, only a sense of suspicion about how they managed to make bread and butter into something so good. The filling was delicious mix of pork and vegetables, with plenty of moistness and rich and savoury umami flavour. Officially/unofficially it was described as a big dumpling, and I love dumplings. I approve of this message.
Next was the extremely unassuming and unattractive Red Bean Pandoro ($10), also recommended to me because I look like I enjoy a good Asian snack. I think the majority of disfigurement comes from the surface layer dusting of yellow powder (I think it might be soy based, I have asked for further clarification – EDIT: Scarlett replied, it is injeolmi based, a Korean rice cake covered in red or mung or azuki or other bean powder), which fills in the Viennoiserie’s natural crevasses. Never having had a pandoro in my life and knowing what they are only from a quick Google, I think I would describe this more as a filled cronutuffin than anything else, with buttery laminated croissant pastry, custard cream filling reminiscent of a filled donut, and in the shape of a muffin. Shape analysis aside, I again quite enjoyed the richness and velvetiness of the internal pastry, which was complimented by this time a sweeter combination of custard cream and red bean paste. The custard cream was surprisingly light and not very viscous, while the red bean paste was more substantial, both in flavour and in texture. The red bean tasted a little bit different to what I had imagined from just looking at it – I wonder if this is because Korean red bean paste is different to Chinese red bean paste, or just because I haven’t had red bean in years because my partner refuses to have it. Either way this dessert as a whole was a little bit sweeter than the Portuguese tart, but very good, possibly better. I couldn’t tell you. I liked all three.
SECOND VISIT, OCTOBER 2022
I found myself back in the area, this time with my partner in tow, and took the opportunity to go back. We had this blueberry tart ($12), laminated pastry with a frangipane filling topped with pastry cream and plump and juicy blueberries. Interestingly the frangipane was a bit herbaceous, kind of basilly, though I am yet to get confirmation. Confirmation received, it was mint.
The other thing we had on our second visit was this banana tiramisu tart ($11). This was pretty good, essentially banoffee, I don’t know what the difference would be between something you’d call banoffee and something you’d call banana tiramisu. It was only whilst looking at my card transaction summary later on at home that I realised that I spent $11-12 a piece on a couple of pastries. I think that it’s easy to ignore the price when you’re there and buying it and then outside and munching it, but that actually is a bit of money, and perhaps why half a decade in the workforce and making a liveable wage (though not by the standards of for example someone even a couple of years into certain fields of finance) we have nothing to really show for it.
All in all, I think you should go. I think there’s probably a bit of a renaissance of Korean-run Viennoiserie on the East Coast at the moment. Maybe it’s my own personal bias as an Asian person, but from Bakemono in Melbourne to Tenacious here in Sydney, some of the highest quality and most interesting pastries are coming from Korean bakers who are able to create both excellent renditions of classics, as well as top-notch fusion offerings.
I’m going to recommend Tenacious Bakehouse to my friend, housemate, and colleague who works down the street at the local faith-based healing service, but he’ll probably tell me he’s had better tarts at some monastery somewhere. Can’t please that guy.
