Sweet Relief: A Look Inside The New Birley Bakery in London
No one does comfort food quite like Robin Birley, whose almonds have just the right salty crunch and whose savory tapenade rolls and buttery sablé cookies disappear within minutes at the parties, lunches and dinners held at his private eating clubs in Mayfair, England.
Until recently, Birley’s baked treats were limited to club members and guests. But now anyone can taste them with the opening earlier this year of Birley Bakery in Chelsea.
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Located in a former dry cleaners on Chelsea Green, a pocket-sized enclave of shops between Sloane Square and South Kensington tube stations, Birley Bakery is a boulangerie-patisserie that serves up freshly baked sweet and savory pastries all day long.
Birley has opened the bakery with Vincent Zanardi, the former executive pastry chef at club 5 Hertford Street, Birley’s Mayfair members’ club. Zanardi has also served as head pastry chef at a string of Michelin-starred restaurants, including L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon in London and Paris.
In an interview over peppermint tea and an almond croissant, Zanardi says Birley’s is the sort of place he remembers as a kid growing up in Paris, an all-day bakery serving the neighborhood everything from a croissant or pain au raisin in the morning to a sandwich on homemade bread at lunch, after-school chocolate chip cookies and special occasion cakes.
“It’s not elitist. It’s for everybody,” says Zanardi, adding that customers are a mix of Birley club members (the neighborhood is one of the most affluent in London), walk-ins paying two pounds for a croissant and locals looking for a quick lunch or weekend treat.
The bakery was a long-held dream of Birley’s whose idea was to share the scrumptious baked goods that have become a hallmark of his clubs, 5 Hertford Street and Oswald’s in Mayfair.
He found the right partners in Zanardi and head baker Eshak Belabed, and went for it. “Together, we spent years looking for the perfect location to open our own bakery, and are thrilled to have successfully found a site in Chelsea Green,” Birley says.
Zanardi says they scouted locations for seven years before finding the Chelsea Green site. They wanted a neighborhood feel and they’re certainly at home on the green, which already boasts a fishmonger, butcher, gourmet grocery store and small shops selling wine or savory pies.
The bakery is bijou, and there are only a few tables and chairs on the far side of the room and a counter with stools facing the green.
Taking up most of the room is a vast sparkling glass case full of pastries, including almond croissants made the old-fashioned way — minus the rich cream filling — and bread loaves galore, including sourdough loaves, seeded baguettes, olive bread, rye bread and tapenade rolls, the latter of which are a staple at Birley’s clubs.
One of Zanardi’s latest creations is a savory treat known as “la cravate,” or necktie. It’s a long and skinny crunchy pastry shell with different fillings such as tomato, mozzarella and basil or tapenade. One of the most popular cravates is filled with a hot dog and dressed with sweet and savory seasonings.
There are slices of onion quiche and pissaladière, the French Riviera’s take on pizza, and sandwiches stuffed with cheese, fresh greens and charcuterie. The counter is crowded with shiny cellophane bags filled with Birley’s famous salted almonds, butter cookies and crackers.
Birley is the son of Lady Annabel Goldsmith and legendary club owner and tastemakere Mark Birley, who named his famous basement club (now owned by Richard Caring and no longer located in a basement) after her and who opened a series of exclusive members’ clubs in London, including Harry’s Bar and George.
In addition to 5 Hertford Street, the basement club Loulou’s, and Oswald’s on Albemarle Street in Mayfair, Birley is working on his first American venture, a club called Maxime’s that’s set to open in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It’s named after his late aunt, the model Maxime de la Falaise.
The younger Birley has been in the hospitality game for decades, launching his career in the ’80s with an eponymous sandwich and salad chain that still operates in east London, the City and Canary Wharf.
While Zanardi may have sharpened his pastry skills at Michelin establishments, he says he loves the simplicity of Birley’s approach, which is why this bakery is sticking with the classics.
Just like his father Mark, Birley makes guests feel as if they’re at a never-ending country house party where the living is easy.
“You have to feel at home. If people are coming for lunch or business, they need to be focused on their conversation. The food is not the star, and it should be easy to understand,” says Zanardi, who was speaking above the bakery’s loud and lively chatter.
Birley’s Bakery was never meant to be a full-blown café, but customers can’t seem to get enough, making themselves at home on the barstools and at the little tables.
The decor, courtesy of the Notting Hill-based JR Design, is lavish and mimics the richness of the ingredients. The dark red wallpaper features gilded 19th-century Japanese motifs, which also appear on the chocolate gift boxes. The striped paper bags and coffee cups are a nod to the rattan seats and style of traditional Parisian brasseries.
A large swathe of the bakery’s glass case is dedicated to desserts, including palm-sized lemon meringue and Tropézienne tarts; wedges of pistachio cream cake, and creations made with chocolate and hazelnuts. There is ice cream on offer, too, as well as takeaway coffee and tea.
Then, of course, there’s the chocolate.
There are bars covered with raisins and nuts; almond and popcorn dragées, and a selection of chocolates made with homemade pralines or in flavors such as matcha lemon; peanut, and dulce de leche.
For Easter, the bakery created a gold leaf-adorned egg made with 80 percent dark chocolate from the Philippines. A single supplier oversaw every aspect of the chocolate-making process, starting with the bean selection.
Zanardi works closely with all of the bakery’s suppliers, many of whom he’s known for years. He sources the chocolate from Switzerland, France and even the U.K., where he discovered a chocolate-maker who imports the beans from Indonesia.
The vanilla comes from Tahiti, from a supplier with whom Zanardi has been working since 1998. He describes the man as “making the best vanilla on the planet.”
Hazelnuts hail from Piedmont, Italy; almonds from Valencia, Spain, and honey from Bermondsey, London. The wheat flour is from an artisanal producer in Burgundy, France, and Zanardi is its sole U.K. customer.
Like Birley, Zanardi wants to get everything absolutely right and for his guests to be happy and sated. His great satisfaction — beyond feeding people — is persuading them to experiment and to find joy in food.
“Cooking is something generous. It’s something you do because you like doing it. You’re giving pleasure to someone. As a chef, you want good feedback. And the best feedback is when people say something like, ‘I usually don’t eat hazelnuts — but this is great,’” Zanardi says.
Given the buzz inside the bakery — and standing room only for some — Zanardi should prepare himself for some more moments of revelation.
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