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London

Lily Vanilli’s Bakery

Coffee, cake and flowers. It’s a good combination. It’s a better combination when it’s Columbia Road Flower Market and Lily Vanilli’s Bakery. Every Sunday Columbia Road in East London teems with market traders selling huge bunches of beautiful flowers and luscious plants. As you can probably imagine, every week it is transformed into the most colourful street in London, and it makes for the perfect lazy Sunday wander, be it summer or winter.

Keeping the crowds fuelled is Lily Vanilli’s Bakery, tucked away off of Columbia Road on Ezra Street, serving up not only delicious freshly baked cakes and brownies, but beautiful ones too. The flower theme runs true into Vanilli’s, with petals decorating sponges daintily alongside tarts piled with the plumpest of fresh berries. It’s the prettiest of spreads.

A long time fan of Lily Vanilli’s cook book Sweet Tooth (the summer berry pillow soft vanilla sponge has earned me quite the baker reputation among friends), it’s a joy to nip in on a Sunday for cake that takes none of the effort bar actually choosing one. With too many enticing looking treats on offer I grabbed a coffee first whilst I mused over my options. At gone 2pm, the spread has whittled down considerably and having missed a lot of what was originally on offer I would recommend getting there during the morning instead. That said, it was still hard to choose from the limited options left. The chocolate cake with salted caramel sauce topped with popcorn (eat in £3.60, take away £3.20) called out to me, as did the berry friands topped with large strawberries. The gluten free lemon and poppy seed cake (eat in £3.60, take away £3.20) got a few look ins too, but I kept coming back to the chocolate brownies with sea salt and pecans (eat in £4.20, take away £3.50), so I dived in and have zero regrets. Enter one of the best brownies I’ve ever had: dense and smooth, melt in your mouth richness, cut through with flakes of sea salt balancing the bitterness of the dark chocolate, and pecans to round the whole thing off. I can highly recommend if you find yourself stuck between choices.

For those who prefer savoury there are insanely good looking sausage rolls (with a vegetarian version to keep non-meat eaters happy), alongside sourdough slices loaded with melted cheese and vegetables. Excellent, strong coffee compliments the baked goods and the atmosphere is buzzy, more often than not with a large queue snaking around the bakery. This place is no secret, and unsurprising, because Lily Vanilli’s is the perfect pitstop: inviting and friendly, tables filled with friends chatting happily among large bunches of blooms in wrapped in brown paper whilst they eat delicious cakes off of mismatched crockery. Yes – coffee, cake and flowers on Columbia Road. It might just be the perfect Sunday.

6 The Courtyard, Ezra Street, London, E2 7RH
Only open Sundays between 08.30am and 4.30pm

Also at Fortnum and Mason every day.

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Petitenget

Oh this place is nice. Suddenly very aware that I look like a beach bum backpacker; with my Bali shorts tasselled with pompoms and my hair chlorined, unbrushed and pulled back into a low ponytail. Seminyak’s Petitenget has an air of France on a summer’s day about it, with comfortable wicker chairs, big glass doors, huge mirrors and a bar lined with Veuve. All this in dovetail grey and with a beautifully patterned tiled floor. Within minutes I was already trying to work out when I could fit in visiting Petitenget again, and that’s just based on the bruschetta and chicken club baguette with bacon and avocado I’ve seen being passed to the table of young hipster Australians across the way from me.

A few days of partying in the beach clubs of Seminyak and you start to crave some goodness, which Petitenget can certainly help with. The restaurant has an organic farm nearby from which 80% of the produce used in the kitchen is farmed. The focus is on sustainable methods and the quality of the fresh, local ingredients used are evident in the dishes served. I ordered the pineapple, green apple and ginger juice (30,000 IDR)- which is deliciously refreshing – along with the pearl barley salad with marinated feta, chickpeas, tomatoes, roast pumpkin, green beans, chilli roasted cashews and a blossom honey vinaigrette (70,000 IDR). The salad was large and filling, beautifully presented and with a good kick of spice to it. I did expect and wished for more feta than was presented dolloped on top, and although the rest of the salad was delicious, I missed that extra saltiness coming through. That said, it was certainly one of the better salads I’ve eaten in all my months in Bali. Dessert was a dark chocolate, espresso and salted caramel tart (65,0000 IDR) topped with glossy pecans and served with a raspberry sorbet that cut through the rich and dense tart well.

The menu here is big, with a wide range of salads – choose from yellow fin tuna, Vietnamese duck, poached chicken, goats cheese, barbecued tiger prawns; risottos and pasta with wagyu meatballs; along with other mains such as fresh snapper, steak and a chicken and seafood laksa. Prices range from 80,000 – 110,000 IDR and whilst a treat if you’re backpacking through Bali, is a steal if you’re on holiday – especially for food of this quality.

Breakfast is just as good if not better than lunch when I return, though I am notoriously biased towards a decent brunch. Smoked salmon, asparagus and scrambled eggs fill a buttery croissant (67,000 IDR) and serve as the perfect filling breakfast to tide me over until I reach next destination hours later. The coffee is strong and the bite sized sample of granola with fruit and yoghurt assures me their healthier offering is strong.

There are a lot of people who seem to know each other here, and you can swiftly tell this is a favourite of Seminyak’s large expat community. An excellent option for breakfast, lunch or dinner and just a stone’s throw from some of the area’s best shopping. The perfect pit stop.

Jl. Petitenget Raya No. 40X, Seminyak, Badung, Bali 80361, Indonesia
+62 361 4733054

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Europe Food From Travels Paris

Café de Flore

Café de Flore is a favourite Parisian institution of mine to visit when in the French capital. With patterned wicker chairs sat facing the world going by under a large canopy, locals and tourists alike frequent this picturesque café on a corner in Saint Germain. Quintessentially and stereotypically French (right down to the stand offish Parisian …

Asia Bali Food From Travels Indonesia Seminyak

Revolver Espresso

Revolver Espresso is well renowned as serving some of the best coffee in Bali, and as I sit on my little distressed table waiting for my long black, I see two separate expats roll up on their scooters and jump off for their regular orders in the space of four minutes. Luckily for me, ‘Baby Revs’, the postcard stamp sized little sibling of the bigger Revolver (just off of Seminyak’s Jalan Kaya Ayu at Gang 51), is a 2 minute walk away from my hostel on Jalan Petitegnet. Revolver is the sort of coffee shop that wouldn’t be amiss in East London or one of Melbourne’s laneways, and I reckon even the snobbiest of Melburnite coffee lovers would agree that the standard of joe is among the best.

Breakfast runs all day at Revolver, menu options named after different types of gun. I tried the simple Avocado on Toast (one of the only dishes not given a fancy name), which was delicious on excellent quality sourdough, though I probably could have had an extra slice. Next up was the Agent 99: goji berry bircher muesli with fresh fruit, which was delicious with grated apple and blueberries atop, reminding me that a healthier option doesn’t man sacrificing taste. On my next visit I struggle to choose from the lunch menu as everything sounds so appetizing, but I go for The Heri – chicken pesto with baby spinach on a toasted baguette – and I’m not disappointed, though more chicken would have been appreciated.

Coffee beans are roasted and blended in Bali and fruit and veg is organic wherever possible, such is the importance placed on putting goodness into your body on the Island of the Gods. The quality of food here is consistently high, I just want slightly bigger portions. That may well be my sheer greed, though. The original Revolver hosts a larger menu to befit its size, including more breakfast options such as pancake stacks as well as burgers and Mexican fare from 11am through until 5pm for lunch, as well as serving a range of juices that would be great to see in Baby Revs.

Next time you find yourself in Seminyak be sure to swing by Revolver for breakfast, lunch or even just a quick coffee with one of their cake slices or tarts. The larger outpost is ideally located in the middle of some of Seminyak’s best boutiques and serves as the perfect pit stop between all the shopping you’ll be enticed into doing.

‘Baby Revs’: Jalan Petitenget No.110, Kuta Utara, Bali 80361, Indonesia