Long Boi’s Bakehouse

Pastry leads at this Levenshulme corner bakery, where an everything bagel croissant sits beside pandan lamingtons and the counter thins out long before the day does.

A small Manchester bakehouse with a pastry identity

Long Boi’s works as a takeaway bakery rather than a café, out of an old corner shop on a leafy residential street in Levenshulme. It has been baking since autumn 2020, which brought a long-disused corner site back into use. The counter shifts with the season and the produce, and it runs sweet and savoury bakes side by side. The named work includes a pandan lamington, the everything bagel croissant filled with dill, spring onion and cream cheese, a cream cheese croissant called The NYC, a cherry crumble danish, plus babkas, tortes and further croissants. Bread is part of the mix but not the house’s own project: the production kitchen is small, so the loaves come from a sourdough bakery in Manchester city centre. Sourcing is specific elsewhere, with produce, milk and eggs arriving weekly from Organic North and R Noone & Son, flour from Wildfarmed and chocolate from Bare Bones in Glasgow.

A pop-in-and-go counter with seats outside

This is a counter visit rather than a long sit-down. Service is takeaway, with a few outside seats when the Manchester weather allows and no indoor seating to speak of. The small site shapes everything: bakes are displayed for quick choosing rather than brought to a table, and the selection is strongest earlier because the counter sells through. Weekends draw a queue, which the corner plot absorbs better than most because the seating is outside anyway. The feel is informal and product-led, and the reuse of an old shopfront is part of what the neighbourhood recognises it for.

Start with the everything bagel croissant

If the everything bagel croissant is on the counter, start there. It captures the house style in one item: laminated dough, a savoury bagel reference, and a dill, spring onion and cream cheese filling. It also sets up the contrast with the sweeter signatures, particularly the pandan lamington and the cherry crumble danish. For a broader order, take the formats the bakery keeps returning to: one croissant, one lamington or danish, and something enriched or cake-led such as a babka or a torte. The NYC cream cheese croissant is the second croissant to look for when it appears, because it reads differently from the everything bagel version. The bakery also takes on occasion cakes, so the sweet side runs past the daily case. A mixed box is the honest way to read the place: one savoury croissant, one seasonal sweet bake, and something chocolate-led if the Bare Bones chocolate is showing.