G’day fellow cafe lovers!
Welcome back to Cards and Cafés! After doing some research online as I was trying to find some new cafés to visit, I came across The Bakers Wife in Camberwell. It seems that lately I’ve been crazy for Camberwell cafés as I’ve been to at least four in the past month. When I first read their menu I knew that I had to add it to my list and was excited that one Saturday I had the opportunity to go and try them out.
The Bakers Wife is located on Burke Road, just like most of the other Camberwell cafés I’ve reviewed in the past (if you haven’t seen those I would highly recommended that you do, click here to see my most recent Camberwell review).
You can’t miss this café as they have a huge painted sign outside. The only problem you might have is trying to find parking. There is street parking (parallel), with some of them having time restrictions of only 15 minutes. So parking down a side street might be a safer option.
I ended up going to this café with my Dad and we both really enjoyed our experience there.
FOOD & DRINKS
The Bakers Wife has an excellent menu, which has a number of mouth- watering dishes to choose from. You’ll be sitting there for ages trying to decide which fantastic creation you feel like eating. They also have a good selection of fresh juices, wines and beers. This was their menu in April 2016, so they might have changed their menu since then.
I first ordered an orange juice to start off my morning and to drink while I ate my breakfast. I love fresh orange juice! This one was fantastic, it was sweet and it still had all the pulp in which made it even better. It was served in a mason jar and was too much for me to drink. It was also very expensive. I don’t think I would have it again at that kind of price.
Juice rating: 4/5 
My Dad ordered a tea, he said that it was very enjoyable but wished that he could have gotten a second cup out of the teapot and also wished that the tea could have been made stronger.
Tea rating: 3/5 
Finally, once I had finished my meal I ordered a latte. It came very quickly after I had ordered it and it was hot when it arrived. It was quite strong and had a beautiful rich taste. It was heavy and thick and definitely went down a treat after my breakfast.The price of the latte is average and is pretty much the same as most of the cafes in the area.
Coffee rating: 4/5
My Dad ended up ordered their daily special which were buttermilk pancakes with butterscotch sauce, banana, nuts and a French cream mousse with vanilla bean. He never orders a sweet dish; he normally orders eggs and bacon on toast. So I was surprised that he tried something new. I also ended up trying some of his breakfast and we both enjoyed it.
He felt that it was a very rich meal and saw it more as a desert than a breakfast. He felt that the sauce was very sweet and almost made him feel ill due to its richness as he’s not used to eating these types of meals. But he said that the pancakes were light and fluffy and that the banana was great! He also loved the crunch of the nuts and thought that the vanilla French cream mousse was delicious (he usually hates cream but seemed to enjoy this). The price was also quite reasonable for this dish, other cafes in the area are charging a bit more for a similar dish.
I ended up ordering the pea and ricotta fritters served with kasundi relish, charred cauliflower, natural yoghurt and toasted pepitas and I also ordered a side of bacon. This is not usually the dish I go for; I would normally go for a sweet dish or the smashed avocado.
It was a very interesting dish with a number of different elements that I would never have thought of doing. I quite enjoyed the fritters themselves, I thought that they had a great flavour and that they were seasoned very well and had a great crunch on the outside. The only thing was some of them were a bit oily which was the only thing that put me off. Once you cut into them you could see the beautiful vibrant green of the peas. I really enjoyed the kasundi relish and thought that it had a very unusual flavour, but it went very well with the fritters.
I disliked the charred cauliflower, eating raw cauliflower in general is a bit strange in my view and definitely not something I want to be eating for breakfast. Even though it is quite different, the cauliflower did not need to be there and in my opinion doesn’t promote the dish.
Would I eat this dish again? No, but I’m glad that I tried something different and I know for next time. I also thought that this was a very expensive dish and definitely not worth the price, it is a very small serving and not overly filling.
ENVIRONMENT & SERVICE
The café itself is so beautiful! You walk inside and you feel like you’ve walked into an art museum. They have beautiful exposed brick throughout the café. On one side, the side we ended up sitting on, they had this incredible painted mural, its beautiful bright colours lit the whole room up.
The other side of the café had exposed red bricks, which just added to the cafés character and charm. These exposed brick walls and wooden floors gave the café a warm industrial feel. I loved that they had wooden floors instead of the usual polished concrete as it gave warmth and character to the place. The exposed rafters in the roof gave us another piece of art to look at.
This has to be one of the most beautiful cafés I’ve been to in a while. You can definitely see that they took a lot of time and effort into designing this place and that everything was carefully thought out.
The employees were very friendly and helpful. A concern was that some of the servers were wearing dirty aprons and it was 9:30 in the morning. At that time of the morning they should still be clean, this can leave a bad impression in the minds of customers.
I would highly recommend that you get to The Bakers Wife before 10am on the weekends to beat the rush and ensure that you get a table. Even though this café has a large number of tables, we noticed that they filled very quickly.
They also have a wide range of freshly made breads and other sweet treats on display near the cash register. Make sure you go and have a look on your way out.
OTHER INFORMATION ABOUT THE BAKERS WIFE
Address: 414-418 Burke Road, Camberwell, Melbourne, (Vic)
Phone: (03) 9809 1133
Operating Hours:
Monday –Closed
Tuesday- Friday –7:00 am- 3:00 pm
Saturday –Sunday – 8:00 am – 3:00 pm
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thebakerswifecamberwell/
CAFÉ RATING = 8/10
Have you visited The Bakers Wife before? Tell me what you thought of it. Do you have any suggestions of cafe’s to visit?
Comment down below, I’m always looking for somewhere new to try.
Until next time,
Happy eating
-Kim
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