Hart’s Bakery

Sourdough, pastries and a counter in a railway arch

The counter stands a few steps from the ovens, inside a large Victorian railway arch beside Temple Meads station, and everything sold at Hart’s Bakery is mixed, proved and baked in that same room. Bread leads. Country rye sourdough and other sourdough loaves come out through the morning, with focaccia alongside them. Founder Laura Hart set the place up as a bakery first and a café second, so the pastry case, the lunch plates and the coffee all arrange themselves around the bakery floor rather than in front of it.

The rest of the counter turns with the season. Handmade pastries, seasonal cakes and savouries change through the week, daily specials decide much of what appears, and a tiramisu cake is tied to Fridays. Coffee comes from Extract, the local roastery, so the drinks are as Bristol as the flour work.

Moveable counters and a working bakery room

The room is simply decorated and built to be rearranged: counters on castors, a gleaming coffee machine set in front of the open workspace, a few tables indoors and benches outside. Production stays visible, which is the point. Bakers move between the prep area and the arch while the queue builds, and the queue is where indecision starts, because bread, buns, cakes and savouries are all in the same line of sight.

It is busy in a station-side way without being only a convenience stop. Locals take the outdoor benches, travellers carry loaves and toasties onto trains, and the bakery has settled into the city as a long-standing Bristol fixture rather than a place you use once.

Order the sausage roll, then look at the buns

On a first visit, start with the Classic Pork Sausage Roll, the clearest named savoury here, sitting beside lunch specials, toasties and whatever seasonal savoury is on that day. A doorstep sourdough toastie is the other route into the same strength: bread made on site, put to direct use.

For something sweet, look at the buns before the cake. The cinnamon bun is the standing order, and the Sticky Caramel Pecan Bun is the richer counter highlight. If tiramisu cake is out, take it as the Friday piece it is. Add an Extract coffee and choose from whatever has just come out of the oven behind the counter.