Artisan Bakery Near Me in Covent Garden: Arôme's Honey Butter Toast

Arôme Bakery is closed on Mondays, opens 8am to 5pm from Tuesday to Saturday and 9am to 4pm on Sunday, and sits at 9 Mercer Street, London WC2H 9QJ, a few steps from the Seven Dials sundial. If you are searching for an artisan bakery near me in Covent Garden, this is where French lamination meets Singaporean and Japanese flavours, and the thick slab of honey butter toast is the order almost everyone makes.

Arôme was founded by Singaporean restaurateur Ellen Chew and French-born pâtissier Alix André. It began as a Soho pop-up before taking its first permanent home on Mercer Street in 2020, opening in the middle of a year when most of central London was shut. The Covent Garden estate's own directory describes its heart as Alix's obsession with time-honoured French technique and with searching out the best ingredients by region.

That partnership explains the counter. The classics are done straight, but sit next to bakes that draw on Chew's Singapore and on Japanese bakery culture: shokupan milk bread, gula melaka, miso and sesame. In 2026 the Good Food Guide named Arôme to its list of Britain's 50 best bakeries, a first-time entry for the shop.

The business has grown to three central London sites. Duke Street in Marylebone is a second bakery and café, and the newest outpost at 90-92 Shaftesbury Avenue focuses on bread and soft-serve ice cream with limited seating, staying open until 9pm from Tuesday to Saturday.

The Mercer Street shop was planned as a showcase. When the lease was announced in autumn 2020, Arôme signed for a 2,000 sq ft unit in The Yards, the Covent Garden block owned by Longmartin, a joint venture between Shaftesbury and the Mercers' Company, and the plan included a glass wall into the open kitchen so customers could watch the patisserie chefs at work. Chew said at the time that the team had spent a long time looking for the right site after the Soho pop-up.

In practice that means you can stand at the counter and see croissant dough being folded and escargots being rolled a few metres away. Arriving at opening gives you the clearest view of the kitchen before the counter crowd builds up in front of the glass. The bakery was backed at launch by Chew's restaurant group, Chew on This.

The signature is the Arôme Honey Butter Toast, a thick slice of fluffy shokupan baked inside a crunchy, caramelised honey crust. The Infatuation, which includes it in its London honey toast power rankings, praises its fluff-to-crunch ratio. Eat it on the spot rather than carrying it home, because the crust softens as it cools.

For something laminated, go for the miso bacon escargot or the pistachio chocolate escargot, then the gula melaka coconut twist, which is the clearest taste of Singapore on the counter. Purists can stick with the Croissant 1930, the shop's take on an all-butter classic, and the pain au chocolat. The fruit danishes are built like small sculptures, with pineapple and mango versions often in the window.

A fair warning: with so much on display it is easy to over-order. Two pastries and the toast is plenty for one person, and the more delicate danishes do not travel well in a paper bag on the Tube. If you want something to take home, choose the sturdier escargots or a loaf of shokupan.

Mercer Street is a short walk from the busiest shopping streets in London, so the shop fills quickly from late morning, particularly on Saturdays. Arriving around 8am on a weekday gives you the widest selection and a better chance of a seat, while mid-afternoon on Sunday can mean the popular escargots are gone before the 4pm close.

Remember the Monday closure: all three Arôme sites are shut on Mondays. If Mercer Street is packed, Duke Street in Marylebone, at 27 Duke Street, W1U 1LE, is the alternative, opening 8:30am to 5:30pm on weekdays, 9am to 6pm on Saturday. For a later craving, Shaftesbury Avenue runs 11am to 9pm Tuesday to Saturday and 12pm to 8pm on Sunday.

The space is a bright, compact café with pastries arranged in long rows behind glass, and you can either eat in or take your order away. Reviewers describe the same first reaction: several minutes staring at the case before giving up and ordering one of everything to go.

Order at the counter and ask about the escargot fillings if the labels are unfamiliar. Seats are limited, so give up your table once you finish. For general questions or large orders the bakery uses email at bonjour@aromebakery.co.uk and posts new bakes on Instagram at @aromebakerylondon.

Mercer Street is one of the seven streets that radiate from the Seven Dials sundial column, so stepping out puts you in one of central London's best browsing areas. Walk to Neal's Yard, the small courtyard of brightly painted shopfronts off Monmouth and Shorts Gardens, and on to Neal Street with its independent shoe and clothing shops.

For a market stop, Covent Garden Piazza and its Apple Market are about five minutes south, and Covent Garden station on the Piccadilly line is closer still. Leicester Square station on the Northern and Piccadilly lines is a similar walk to the west if you are heading on to Soho.

Address: Arôme Bakery, 9 Mercer Street, London WC2H 9QJ. Hours: Monday closed, Tuesday to Saturday 8am to 5pm, Sunday 9am to 4pm. Other sites: 27 Duke Street, London W1U 1LE (Tuesday to Friday 8:30am to 5:30pm, Saturday 9am to 6pm, Sunday 9am to 4pm) and 90-92 Shaftesbury Avenue, London W1D 5EA (Tuesday to Saturday 11am to 9pm, Sunday 12pm to 8pm).

Email bonjour@aromebakery.co.uk for questions. The honey butter toast is best eaten warm at the shop, and arriving at opening is the surest way to see the whole range before it starts to sell through.