Best eco-friendly bakeries in East London
Coffee dates are becoming more popular, and for good reason too - they can be less of a time and money commitment compared to meeting at a bar, as well as allowing for a more genuine connection than masking the night away intoxicated. But without a feta and honey oozing focaccia or sweet almond swirling pastry in hand, that’s only half the fun. Bakeries-turned-cafes are a wonderful answer to this, given unlike a typical bakery catering for passersby and pick-ups only, you can sponge up the atmosphere as the smell of hot, plumpened dough wafts out from the oven - and make it something of a ritual.
Whether you’re on a date with a lover, your friend or yourself, this bakery guide takes us to East London, to pinpoint the best bakery-cafe-combos diligently firing up minimally-processed, locally-sourced ingredients. Because for us, the true icing on the cake of any bakehouse is its commitment to its environment and community.
E5 Bakehouse, Hackney
Back-to-basics baking at E5
Housed in an unassuming tunnel near London Fields is a bakery with a difference. E5 Bakehouse, named after its postcode as a nod to its commitment to the surrounding community, sources its products locally and organically and makes its bread fresh on site. The wheat is grinded to flour in its French stone mill, while the bakehouse also supplies itself with fruit, vegetables and cereals from its very own farm in Suffolk.
As the bakery deepend its commitment to sourcing organically grown grains, it discovered that heritage wheat grown before the agricultural revolution was not bred for systems that make use of fertilisers, herbicides, fungicides and pesticides. As this traditional variety is naturally taller, they are able to better wade out weeds, rather than their more intensively farmed, shorter wheat counterparts which are reliant on artificial chemicals to do the fighting for them.
So, the farm focuses on traditional and regenerative agricultural methods that protect farmers’ livelihoods, soil health, carbon emissions and biodiversity. This also means Hackney sourdough-loving residents enjoy some of the best quality sandwiches and croissants about.
The bakery is one to watch for London foodies, with a second site in Poplar (as it was so popular of course), which opened to employ and train refugee communities while investing back into projects supporting and welcoming refugees. As of earlier this summer, its baking sights are set to culture, as it serves fresh and nourishing goods to visitors of the V&A East Storehouse in Hackney Wick.
THE Dusty Knuckle, Dalston
Dusty’s Walnut loaf
The Dusty Knuckle, kneading its dough in both its Dalston headquarters and not too far away in Harringay, is a bakery serving up enticing pizzas and pastries with a social difference. The bakery works with young people coming out of custody and aims to mould confidence and optimism into the futures of those with a challenging start. The idea is - to schoolfriend co-founders Max Tobias and Rebecca Oliver - that a busy bakery helps to teach young people vital workplace skills, like cooperation, organisation, on top of the top class baking experience they take home.
In an interview, Tobias says he wants the bakery to be a “stepping stone” giving people a sense of purpose and to move away from a past that no longer serves them. The bakery won recognition from King Charles’ award for providing opportunities for young people, given in its 12-week programme almost two thirds went on to find employment or further education.
It’s not solely their purpose-driven values in running the business that stirs up excitement with customers though. The feathery potato sourdough makes its way across London to thousands of loyal customers and lucky restaurant recipients each day, and being so tasty even Yotam Ottolenghi once called to request a supply of bread for his six restaurants. For these deliveries, the bakery uses bicycle trailers rather than a cargo - meaning they transport several goods a day with zero impact on air quality (and zero fuel costs too).
The bakery’s support of the community extends to sourcing ingredients locally: a double win to ensure their freshness too. The kitchen focuses on organic flours and seasonal ingredients, with tastebud-stimulating focaccia sandwiches available in the day including Pip'n'Nut peanut sauce with roasted glazed aubergines, a chilli, lime, carrot & diakon slaw, as well as marinated and spiced chicken with a yoghurt and aioli sauce, spicy raisin and shallot pickle, turmeric almonds, crispy chicken skin & lime dressed baby gem.
If you might fancy your bakery hit later on, pizza and wine nights are here for the summer months, lighting up Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings. While pizza is the name of the game here, deep-fried dough with parmesan and thyme honey is a sublime way to start.
Forno, London Fields
Forno is a sophisticated hipsters dream, and a very tasty one too
Another birthchild of lockdown, Forno opened when Ombra team - the Italian pasta restaurant focused on seasonal ingredients and natural wines sitting atop the Hackney canal - got inventive selling deli treats to locals when indoor dining was a no-go.
They opened doors under another rail arch in Hackney (like E5 Bakehouse), and similar to its Hackney neighbour, flour is milled on-site, ingredients are sourced locally where possible and relationships are cherished with their farmers, including Flourish Farm near Cambridge as well as other smaller organic and biodynamic farms and Neal’s Yard for its cheeses.
The Italian-focused bakery churns out arguably some of the most tantalising baked goods you can think of - with fluffy doughnuts laden with perfectly rippled sweet cream or crispy compresses of chocolate and pistachio pain suisse. In fact, just the coffee itself is worth travelling across the city for.
Savoury lovers are accounted for too, with delightful mortadella and burrata filled focaccia or caramelised onion, salami and mozzarella slices among the sandwiches and pizzas on offer. If that’s the way to your heart, the space is also groomed up enough to do weddings, or if you want to learn how to sweeten the pasta deal at home, there are fresh pasta-making classes that take place too.
Stay tuned for our next guide to the best eco-friendly bakeries, leading us pastry and coffee lovers North of the river.