Sydney’s lower north shore is easily one of the city’s most handsome areas. Now it has a gorgeous Italian-tinged bakery to match: Fiore Bread, which recently opened in a jacaranda-lined pocket of McMahons Point.

It’s a tiny operation by partners Samantha Dean and Alberto Dal Bosco, who are selling sourdough bread, simple-but-considered sandwiches, Mecca coffee and a slew of specialty pantry items, many of which travel well on a thick, door-stopping slice of Fiore’s house-baked hero loaves.

“In Italy, we call it an ‘alimentari’. You can go in there and buy fresh bread, or a sandwich, buy a few things. It’s like a little grocer,” Dal Bosco tells Broadsheet.

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The pair met (and fell for each other) seven years ago working together at Paddington pizzeria, Love Supreme. Dal Bosco, who comes from Veneto in Italy’s north-east, was the pizza chef and Dean worked front-of-house. Dal Bosco’s fascination with fermentation eventually led him to the oven at Iggy’s, the Sydney-famous Bronte bakery supplying many of the city’s fine diners with transcendent sourdough. But Fiore is the place the pair always meant to open together, combining Dal Bosco’s baking skills with Dean’s hospitality and business background.

It’s one of several top bakeries (among them Staple and Black Cockatoo) using sustainable, heritage and ancient grain flours from Wholegrain Milling in Gunnedah, a pioneer of old-world wheat varieties lost to modern farming practices. Dough is fermented slowly over three days to improve aroma and texture, resulting in a loaf with a sturdy dark crust and a moist, flavoursome crumb.

“Day by day we’ll give customers a different type, which could be wholemeal with walnut, olive bread, pecan and raisin. Next week it might be cacao with hazelnut or some other kind of sweet bread,” says Dal Bosco.

As well as loaves, Fiore sells sourdough brioche and something called “the wheel”: a tearable cluster of panini rolls baked into a doughy disc the size of a small Michelin tyre.

“We can credit Iggy’s for the wheel,” says Dean. “We basically do a 30-piece unit, which we can sell as a whole – which is really great for parties – or as an individual roll. People can buy as few or as many as they want. And we also use the wheel to make our sandwiches.”

While current sandwich trends mandate Instagrammable monstrosities with 50 fillings and a whopping price tag to match, Fiore’s well-priced panini are the sandwich equivalent of a Margherita pizza: elemental, yet approaching something close to perfection.

It’s $6 for a small roll torn from the wheel, or $12 for the larger focaccia option. Fillings might include mortadella or LP’s salami paired with a sharp Italian cheese; tomato, bocconcini and basil; or eggplant roasted in the bread oven.

Dal Bosco also worked for at time at Penny Four’s in Leichhardt, a patisserie responsible for what is arguably one of Sydney’s most superb croissants. While there are no plans to recreate that labour-intensive treat here, he’ll instead put his pastry skills to work with tarts by the slice, and Italian doughnuts, or bombolone, in the not-too-distant future.

Fiore also showcases goods not easily found north of the bridge: Ultra Culture hot sauces from Melbourne, Lulu’s Remedy chilli oil from Sydney’s inner west, Mount Zero olives and oil from the Grampians region in Victoria, and Olasagasti anchovies from Spain. Fiore also sells milk, butter and house-made granola, and will even slice you up a few hundred grams of deli meat to take home.

Named after the Italian word for flower (a subtle play on the bakery’s hero ingredient), Fiore is a pretty little spot. A design by Dean’s sister’s creative studio, The Make Haus, retains the space’s original terrazzo floors and stained-glass windows. Funky stools by Italian designer Martino Gamper are strewn out the front, where you can pull up with a coffee and a panini and bask in the warm winter sun.

Fiore Bread
129 Blues Point Road, McMahons Point

Hours:
Tue to Sun 7am–3pm

fiorebread.com
@fiorebread