Let’s face it, it’s an Inner West trait to get excited when a new local café opens up, no matter how many adorn our streets, we can’t get enough of them. And when that new café gives us something special – a space to feel good in, and food that tickles our tastebuds we go a little bit nuts, in a good way.

The newest Inner West Address, The Sunday Baker on Stanmore Road, Petersham, is one of those places, taking up residence in the former Daisy’s Milk bar (which we all shed a little tear for when it closed at the beginning of this year).

The Sunday Baker is a family affair with two twin girls stealing the show and mum Jacqueline who’s baked goods have sent the Summer Hill Flour Markets into a spin over the past 9 months. Head in and you’ll meet Adelaide on front of house, catch glimpses of twin sister Isabella when she’s not busily pumping out the food from the kitchen. Youngest daughter Cordelia is on weekend dish patrol, Max is your friendly Barista, Tim’s the all round lovely helper and you may even see dad, Anthony who is happily chief taster of the family. All while busy mum Jacqueline continues baking in the background.

Food wise expect fabulous fresh baked goods and all day brunch favourites with a twist and as far as the space – they’ve channelled their love of Peggy Porschen (a glorious pink café in London) and crossed it with the clean aesthetic of Phillipa’s Bakery in Melbourne. They wanted to create a light, bright space where everyone feels comfortable and welcome and they’ve done this in spades. They’ve honoured the history of the site and kept the wonderful booths and the gorgeous pink door from Daisy’s Milkbar. They’ve re-purposed the wood from the Daisy’s counter into the current counter and bench seating and also kept the lovely front window bench.

Here’s what will excite you at The Sunday Baker:

Your baked goods are next level and feel like they’ve been baked with a lot of love, what inspired your families’ love of baking? Our mum grew up surrounded by wonderful home country bakers especially her Nana and lovely back fence neighbour Ida (who was the first person to teach her how to bake scones). Our nana continued the tradition and together with mum we have been learning to cook from as soon as we were old enough to lick a beater.

We started selling at the Flour Mill Markets last September. Our specialities are fresh baked brownies (they aren’t called Better Than Sex for nothing), light as air sponges, delicious lemon tarts and a range of lovely cupcakes and other sweet treats.

All treats are baked using the best quality fresh ingredients and we like to offer a range of treats everyone can enjoy including many gluten free and vegan friendly options.

What made you decide to branch out from the markets into a cafe? We produce a range of lovely special occasion retail biscuits and we were looking for a commercial kitchen so that we could expand that range and service more retail outlets but we were also keen to find a permanent home. Many of our market customers kept asking when we were going to have a store so this seemed like a natural progression.

Can you tell us about some of your most popular baked goods? Our Better Than Sex Brownies as well as our Hipster Brownies (GF/Vegan) are very popular and our old fashioned passionfruit and jam sponge and deep lemon tart always sell out fast. Our coconut slice and Lemon Vovos (our take on the iconic Aussie Iced Vovo biscuit) are based on our Nana’s coconut slice recipe and the scone recipe was learnt by our mum from her neighbour Ida when she was around 8 years old.

We also serve up a revolving range of cupcakes including our very popular chocolate unicorn cupcakes with candy floss frosting – they always seem to fly out the door.

You sell some local Inner West goods and use a lot of local produce, can you tell us more about this? We have tried to use as many local suppliers as possible. Currently all of our jams come from Justin at Drunken Sailing Canning (Dulwich Hill), Nicole from I made a Pickle is just around the corner in Petersham and makes all our pickles. We also sell local Dulwich Hill made Kombu Kombucha, Muscle Honey (Bankstown), Famous Soda (Sydney based sugar free sodas) as well as fabulous bread pastries from Marickville’s Brickfields Bakery.

Our delicious wagon wheels are made by Sweet Petes Treats who are based in Glebe, our tea is from Newtown’s TTotaler Tea, butter from Pepe Sayer Butter in Marrickville and last (but certainly not least) our coffee is from Campos.

Barista Max was intent on making me the perfect coffee, can you tell us about why you chose Campos? We believe that for coffee to be truly good it needs to be sustainably and ethically sourced. We did a lot of research prior to deciding on a coffee partnership and Campos won hands down. We want what we do to impact positively not only on our local community but also on the communities that produce the coffee that our success depends on. We make all of our baked goods and meals with care using ethically sourced products and Campos does the same so we feel that the Campos is the perfect fit for our business including any future expansion and endeavours.

Apart from the baked goods what style of food can Inner Westies look forward to? We have a mix of favourite brunch options Our Inner West Mortgage (smashed avo Sunday Baker style) is already very popular and our homemade Hippie rolls, which are vegan and classic Aussie sausage rolls are proving a real hit. We have mini versions of our brunch options for the smaller members of the family, great milkshakes and even water for the fur babies in the family.

The Sunday Baker is located at 340 Stanmore Road, Petersham and is open Tuesday to Sunday 7am – 4pm (kitchen closes at 3pm – coffee, drinks and treats still available until 4pm). They also offer whole cakes and catering options by prior arrangement.

Follow the Sunday Baker on Instagram and head in and say hi, your tastebuds will thank you.

Annika and Blake

#myinnerwestaddress