& Clarke's

& Clarke's
Bakery & Shop
Kensington Church Street, London

This is, I think, one of the best bakeries in London. The breads are all wonderful and fresh and reasonably priced for their fine-food shop flare. They have a glorious variety, the largest, of fresh bread rolls that are large and small sizes for .30p small and .50large. What a deal!

The employees here are lovely and helpful, and always have a smile on their face. This shop serves baked goods, breads, pastries, cakes, cheese, and jams-chutneys-spreads, with biscuits too! You can find a great deal of fine foods here, all fresh. Not to mention, they sell my favorite white bread, PUGLIESE! I love it, and it's silky and soft as I always love it.

Prices here can't really be beat for their quality. The breads are so lovely, and better priced than most at Borough Market even.

This fine foods shop opens at 8AM, when you can stroll in and have the fresh bread right out of the oven. It is a well-kept shop with Sally Clarke's Cafe in the back, only open for lunch from noon-2pm. Then there's the & Clarke's Bread, and & Clarke's (this shop which as it all). They're all in this shop, and the cafe is in the back. This charming little shop is a find in London.

Belgian Dark Chocolate Truffles with Cocoa Powder
Clarke's "famous hand rolled bitter chocolate truffles are made with dark Belgian chocolate, double cream, free range eggs & Belgian cocoa powder" 68 pence a pop.
How lovely, I had one, and it was filled with belgian dark chocolate goodness, about the size of a ping-pong ball. I loved the cocoa dusted outer shell. It gave it a slight bitter flavor, but with the sweet inner cream of the shell truffle this was magnificent and just what I needed to satisfy my sweet cravings. I still ended up buying bread though, as always.

Pugliese Loaf
2.40 for a large, 1.30 for small. This is my favorite white fresh bread anywhere in the world. I love Campagne too, but I think this takes the cake, at least in America. This is a new loaf to Clarke's, and it's so silky, smooth, soft, and fresh! It actually tastes almost exactly like Pain du Campagne, except they're different shapes. A wonderful bread, I recommend. Great prices too!

Bread Rolls Assorted
Wholemeal (?)(back left), Poppy Seed (back right), Brioche Loaf (far right), White Roll (middle), Wholewheat (bottom-most), Walnut (bottom right)

100% WHOLEMEAL (?)
"Made with 100% wholemeal flour available as a tin or round loaf"
I don't know, this looks more like a slight grain bread to me.
I think this is the roll I had, the wholemeal by name I mean. I got a large roll, and it was worth the 50pence, great deal for the size. It was fresh and good too. Soft. I had the roll in the upper-most left back. Perhaps it was a rustic bread (?), but the clerk really wasn't sure either. Anyway, it was good. It was really good; a soft, large bread roll with fresh flavor to it. It almost had a grain taste to it too. Yep, it was probably wholemeal, didn't look like it though. My roll was lightly dusted with potato flour.

Ciabatta & Spiced Fruit Rolls

Spiced Fruit Rolls (right)
"Baked in a tin this bread contains sultanas, mixed peel and mixed spice"
Didn't get to try it, but it looked heavily packed with these sultanas, dried grapes that still looked a bit juicy

Ciabatta (left)
"Slipper shaped peasant style bread made with extra virgin olive oil, unbleached white flour and very small amounts of salt and yeast"

This ciabatta bread was incredibly smooth and silky, so soft, you could tell it had olive oil in it, but it wasn't oily looking at all. This was dusted lightly with potato flour.

FIG & FENNEL
"A narrow stick with dried figs and fennel seeds"

The fig and fennel loaves are half the size of the Pugliese loaves, but look so good! I can see the figs inside, halved juicy figs, and it also has fennel in it. The loaves were a bit on the harder side, but maybe that's just the outside. These were dusted in some flour as well. I gotta try these next time.

Don't miss out on & Clarke's. It's a real find!