Bread & Circus Wholefoods Canteen

Cafes and restaurants that serve traditional wholefoods properly prepared are few and far between in Sydney. Bread & Circus wholefoods canteen in Sydney's inner west, owned and operated by Amanda Bachara, stands out as a shining beacon in Sydney's wholefoods scene. Don't let the name fool you into thinking that it's bread-focused or that acrobatic shenanigans are afoot.

I lunched there with close friend and natropath Anthia Koullouros a couple of months ago and was thoroughly impressed. Anthia goes so far to say that this canteen offers "the best breakfasts in Sydney". High praise indeed from one of Australia's wholefood gurus.

The canteen shares a space with a local coffee shop in a huge light airy warehouse befitting of Alexandria. Long communal tables, mountains of fresh produce whenever you turn and gorgeous table centre pieces create a beautifully decorated fresh colourful space.

I interviewed Amanda about her food ethos for the canteen with my standard pesky questions:

Q. Do u use any industrialised vegetable oils in your store eg canola oil, vegetable oil, cottonseed, rice bran etc

A. only unrefined olive oil and organic butter used

Q. What is the provenance of the meat, eggs, dairy  and produce that you serve?

A.  The beef is grass fed from GRUB [Grass Roots Urban Butchery].

The  chicken is organic and free range.

The eggs are free range and biodynamic.

The milk is organic.

The yoghurt and ricotta are biodynamic. Other cheeses such as blue vein and parmesan are authentic and expensive and come from places that follow very traditional practices but not necessarily labelled as certified organic etc.

The  all juicing fruits, and most other fruits are organic.

The vegetables are about 50/50 organic/conventional.  I go for the best/cleanest tasting product. The best tomatoes I've tried aren't organic, so we use them.

Q. What are your desserts sweetened with? 

A. rapadura sugar , brown rice syrup, raw honey, demarara etc. No white sugar anywhere.

Q.  I note that there are grains in the menu (which all restaurants serve). Are any of your grains properly prepared eg sourdough bread, soaked, sprouted etc?

A. pancake grains are soaked and the oats and nuts for smoothies and porridge are soaked. We do not soak farro and other grains.

Q. How often does the menu change?

A. We make the menu up in the morning and start cooking it right away. Click here to see the daily menu. I ordered the large sharing plate of a mix of all of the salads with a side of grilled haloumi (I am Cypriot after all!)

To drink, Bread & Circus offers filtered (reverse osmosis) water, extensive range of exotic organic teas, dandy lattes, cold pressed juices and more recently coffee.

Opened in November 2011, Bread & Circus is open 7 days from 7am-4pm.

I highly recommend Bread & Circus for breakfast or lunch (from noon). Plus it's very kid friendly.

Contact Details: Shop 2, 21 Fountain Street, Alexandria. ph (02) 9698 2939. You can check it out or Like the canteen on Facebook here.

Have you been to Bread & Circus? What did you think?