The plain croissants were gone by 9:30am. So were the chocolate wattleseed and the cracked corn with bomba calabrese butter. Since opening the doors of Daybaker on Monday 25 May, Charlie Duffy has been selling out of his laminated pastries long before the breakfast crowd has finished their coffee.
The Abbotsford bakery, tucked into a compact site at 66 Nicholson Street that once held Little Molli, isn’t short on demand. It is short on seating, short on menu items, and deliberately short on production. Duffy, a former pastry chef at Tivoli Road Bakery and Small Batch, built a loyal following for his layered croissants and pain au chocolat, and Melbourne’s brunch set has turned out in force.
“I want it to be a well-made pastry first and foremost,” Duffy said. “There are fillings, but they shouldn’t overpower it. You should still taste the dough.”
That philosophy shapes everything inside the tiny shop. The daily core is three items: a plain croissant, a chocolate version studded with wattleseed, and a savoury cracked corn croissant filled with bomba calabrese butter, made with co-fermented corn dough. Seasonal pastries rotate alongside a few lunch options, like Roman-style pizzas and sandwiches on stirato bread, and coffee comes from Square One.
Duffy sources flour from Tuerong Farm, produce from Days Walk Farm, and pistachios from Warrina Produce. The pistachios are grown by paediatrician Shane O’Dea, who delivers them himself after hospital shifts. The connections are personal, and the produce is unmistakably Victorian.
“I like the fact that it’s not too big. Having some element of restriction is a good thing. It forces you to get a bit more creative,” Duffy said of the space.
Working alongside him are pastry chef Katie Dale, who also came from Small Batch, Maeve Rooney, who trained at Scotland’s acclaimed Lannan bakery, and front-of-house Miku Hayashi, formerly of Acoffee. The team mirrors the bakery’s tight focus: a handful of people producing a deliberately small number of things.
Online, the arrival has been met with fevered Instagram posts and forum chatter. Early birds are posting their hauls. Late risers are posting empty cabinets. The consensus is blunt: arrive before 9:30am or miss out.
The takeaway is simple. Daybaker opens at 7:30am and closes at 2:30pm, but the pastry window is narrower than the opening hours suggest. If you want the full range, set an alarm.
This is not a place to linger over a full breakfast spread or pick up a sourdough loaf. Daybaker does not make bread. There is no phone, no website with live stock updates, and the menu changes with what arrives from the farms. The promise is a pastry worth the early trip, and that is exactly what you get.
Where larger bakeries spread their attention across dozens of items, Duffy has deliberately shrunk the focus. The result is a shop that sharpens his Small Batch legacy rather than expands it, in a setting that feels more like a neighbourhood secret than a destination queue.
Public transport makes the visit easier. Tram 109 runs along Victoria Street and stops a short walk away. Collingwood and North Richmond stations, on the Mernda and Hurstbridge lines, are about ten minutes on foot. Street parking is scarce, so cyclists and walkers have the advantage.
After an early pastry, Yarra Bend Park is a few blocks east for a morning walk along the river, and the Abbotsford brewery strip sits just downhill from Nicholson Street.
But the most memorable detail might be O’Dea, the paediatrician who grows the pistachios. He finishes a shift at the hospital and drives the nuts to the bakery himself. That is the kind of supply chain that doesn’t scale. For Duffy, that is exactly the point.
Quick Facts
City of Yarra
The City of Yarra is the local government area covering inner Melbourne suburbs including Abbotsford, Collingwood, Fitzroy and Richmond. It manages planning, community services, parks and local business support in one of Melbourne’s most vibrant and densely populated regions.