Bread The Artisan Bakery
Where: 97 Churchill Road, Morningside
Open: Monday to Friday 7am to 4pm, Saturday to Sunday 7am to 2pm.
Call: 076 105 9002
Bread is situated in a lovely old double-storey home on the corner of Windermere and Churchill Roads. It is the home of Pieter Venter’s artisanal bakery that opened across the road a number of years ago.
It’s a charming and comfortable space, with a lovely old world feel. From a giant mural of an Italian café scene, to the old family photos on the wall and a miscellaneous collection of dressers stocking the deli. There are Persian carpets on the floor and quirky bric-a-brak scattered around.
There’s a table in the centre piled with cakes and chocolate brownies. On the far wall is all the deli stuff, most of it produced by Venter himself. Blackberry jam and kumquat jam are things you won’t see often. There’s pickles and a selection of honeys. And then there’s the day’s baking ‒ white and wholemeal sourdough, croissants etc all in baskets.
Food is served on mix-and-match antique plates in a variety of fun patterns, and it’s the same with the cutlery. It’s been a style I’ve always enjoyed since it was revived in Durban by the original Antique Café, which is next door.
A small fridge has all the pies lined up, neatly labelled with options like chicken and tarragon, or chicken and mushroom. There’s even duck options, one with orange and another with ginger. I took the latter home, and certainly would recommend it. It’s always great to have pies with unusual fillings.
On the day the Glass Guy and I popped in there was an 80th birthday party going on in the one room, providing lots of laughter and enjoyment.
We found a spot first on the sofa and then, as a table became available, on the verandah outside.
The menu is chalked up on a board, although as Venter says, “We can do most things.” There’s breakfasts like scrambled eggs and smoked salmon on their sourdough toast or a croissant, and there is an array of sandwiches which show off their breads. Think chicken mayo and bacon and egg etc, plus croque monsieur ‒ that famed cheese and ham sandwich fried in butter ‒ and croque madame, which is topped with a fried egg. There was a lovely smell of bacon cooking as we entered. A variety of posh avo sarmies fills another blackboard.
The vegetable soup was already finished for the day by the time we arrived, so I opted for their home made pies served with chips and gravy (R75). The roast beef pie was delicious, although the chips would have benefited from a second frying. But they still soaked up that lovely rich salty gravy.
The Glass Guy tried the creamed mushrooms on toast (R65), which was a tasty and very simple light lunch. I’d previously had the Welsh rarebit with bacon on that artisanal toast and enjoyed it.
We finished up with coffees, despite the fact that it was my fourth for the day, which were enjoyable, and chocolate brownies, which while not quite the fudgy brownies one normally expects, had a wonderful deeply dark chocolate flavour.
It was an enjoyable quick lunch.
Food: 3 ½
Service: 3 ½
Ambience: 3 ½
The Bill: R 250 including a loaf of sourdough.
The Independent on Saturday