The Bakehouse (Marsiling Mall Hawker Centre)

It does seem that bakehouses that are located within hawker centres are getting rather common of the late; whilst most of such establishments have opened their doors within the area around town such as that of Cat in the Hat at Golden Mile Food Centre, My aunty’s bakery at Market Street Food Centre, as well as Lian Hup Heng and Petite Krumbs which are both located in Amoy Street Food Centre, there also has been the opening of divine bites that is situated within the heartlands at Pasir Ris Central Hawker Centre. Turns out, such an establishment can also be found in the North; introducing The Bakehouse at Marsiling Mall Hawker Centre — it is said that the establishment had already started business in the food centre since November 2024. The stall occupies a shop unit that is located in the middle of the food centre that is twice as wide as that of some of the other stalls located within the same food centre; one would like not be able to miss their existence considering how its signage is in a shade of bright red — its simple signboard is a stark contrast of the more traditional signboards that its neighbours uses. As the namesake of the stall suggests, these folks are a bakery though also one that is albeit more modern as well — the full line-up of bakes available at The Bakehouse would include muffins, tarts financiers, Madelines and cookies; everything that is available for the day would be prominently displayed in the display case at the counter.

Little is known about The Bakehouse and its operating hours; that being said, we had tried visiting them around 11:00am to 11:30am to find the shutters halfway down, while there wasn’t much left when we made our decision to drop by the stall at 1pm on a weekend. With only a couple of muffins and some financiers to choose from, we found ourselves going with the Mocha Walnut Crumble Muffin; this was one out of the three (3) muffin flavours that was still in-stock when we dropped by in the early afternoon on the weekend. It does seem that the focus at The Bakehouse is very much on their muffins — sinking our teeth into the Mocha Walnut Crumble Muffin, we did find that their muffins were of a consistency that was suitably dense; there are some muffins out that here a little clumpy and difficult to swallow after a while, but the muffin from The Bakehouse still feels pretty much manageable throughout the whole portion. Being a muffin with a mocha element, there was a light note of coffee that perfumes throughout the muffin; all that whilst the chopped walnuts helped to add a note of nuttiness and an element of crunch while at it. One can also find clusters of crumbles atop the muffin, giving the muffin yet another dimension of crunch that is lightly sweet. The overall level of sweetness for the muffin is pretty adequate; definitely not one that felt like it was overly so.

Apart from the Mocha Walnut Crumble Muffin, we had also given the Lotus Cookie Financier a go; this does seem to be a regular financier that is topped off with a Lotus biscuit on the batter before going into the oven to bake. The financier itself does come with an adequate density for its texture; the edges also coming slightly crisp which would have been pretty satisfying if these were had fresh out-of-the-oven. Whilst the financier does come with a hint of buttery, vanilla notes with a bit of sweetness, most of the sweetness does seem to come from the Lotus cookie that came above; still delivering a crunch and a sort of sweetness similar to that of Speculoos (i.e. cookie sauce). Considering how this part of the North is usually fairly slow to the trends in the local F&B scene, the opening of The Bakehouse within Marsiling Mall Hawker Centre is a little bit of a surprise by itself — it is quite a pity that we did not get to give their tart offerings a go considering how they were already sold out at the point of time we had made our visit to The Bakehouse. Still, having tried some of its other offerings, we do feel compelled to return to give their lemon tarts and Madelines a go soon.