First Look: Za’atar Knot or Cinnamon Scroll? The Choice Is Tough at Inner West Newcomer Martha’s

Have you ever heard of Wareemba? I, for one, had not heard of it until last week – and I lived a few suburbs away for years. It’s a neighbourhood that’s just five blocks wide, 15 minutes from the city by car, part of the inner west and, now, home to Martha’s.

“I just really loved this corner spot, it felt like it had a lot of potential,” the new bakery’s owner Paris Nassif tells Broadsheet. “I knew about Five Dock and Abbottsford, but I didn’t know that these four streets existed as Wareemba. When we signed the lease, I realised this was a different suburb. People are like, ‘Wareemba … are you in the sticks?’”

The good-looking bakery opened to immediate support from locals. Glossy cherry-hued tiles dress up the facade, with butter-yellow walls inside. Stainless steel racks display sweet and savoury pastries, and there’s a window through to a small pastry workshop where you can watch the lamination happen.

Nassif worked with a pastry consultant to refine their pastry program, building a strong in-house team to laminate, shape and bake. That team features a a head pastry chef and a few to support, and a small kitchen team for the tight toast-based menu – with the likes of taramasalata-topped rye, a roll stuffed with tzatziki and spiced lamb, and a cheesy brekkie roll with sausage, a fried egg and the house sauce.

The deeply bronzed plain croissants are everything you want them to be: crunchy, flaky, slightly salty – and much of the remaining have flavours of the Med and the food Nassif, who’s Palestinian, grew up eating. “We didn’t want to just do another almond croissant – we wanted something that has a bit more influence from the flavours we enjoy, so we added cardamom spice and rosewater, with rose petals on top.”

That pretty bake is a top pick, as is the za’atar and goat’s cheese knot, ready to tear up and swipe through a side of tahini. There’s a ham and cheese croissant revved up with jalapenos, with a sesame-studded top that’s skewered with a guindilla, plus an ’nduja and eggplant option.

Her grandma’s-recipe carrot cake sits next to whopping brownies and pastel de nata-style custard tarts and a mix of chunky cookies. Plus, choccy croissants with “triple the standard amount” of chocolate and a savoury-sweet monkey bread sweet with coconut and cut with lime.

Pastries are baked throughout the day, but numbers are limited while the team focus on quality and consistency.

This is Nassif’s first solo venue, but her family’s behind Strathfield’s Bar Biscotti and are part of The Bearded Bakers, the lively knafeh-making troupe. You could say hospitality’s in her blood.

“Martha is a figure from the Bible, she is a figure of service. She’s quite chaotic, but her intention’s always to show love and put food on the table, and I resonate with that quite a lot,” Nassif says. “I try to be not so chaotic. The point is really about love and service.”

Single O coffee spans the regulars, batch brews and short blacks to sip quickly with a side of sparkling water at the standing espresso bar. Then there are two self-serve taps, one for the house blend cold brew and another rotating, which is currently a maple brown butter latte. It gets event funkier: a super-sweet cinnamon scroll cold brew, or a Single O cold brew spiked with orange and cardamom then topped with vanilla foam. Plus, a blackberry spin on the strawberry matcha craze.

“We’ve seen the same faces every day for the last two weeks,” Nassif says. “So that tells me we’re doing something right.”

Martha’s
312 Great North Road, Wareemba

Hours:
Wed to Sun 6am–4pm

@marthassydney