The best bakeries in Leeds for bread, pastries and cinnamon buns

Leeds does bread properly. Whether you want a long-proved sourdough, a flaky almond croissant or a cinnamon bun to eat on the walk home, there are four bakeries here that earn the journey. Hours change, so check before you set off, especially on a weekend.

Nova Bakehouse, Leeds Dock

Unit 33, The Boulevard, Leeds Dock, LS10 1PZ. Sisters Sarah Lemanski and Hannah Mather opened it in 2019, and it is the only Leeds bakery in the Good Food Guide's 50 Best Bakeries in Britain 2026, for the second year running. The Yorkshire Evening Post describes the bread and pastries as flavour-forward, and says the bakery supports small-scale millers and biodiverse farming.

What to order: the sourdough, which the bakery says is made over three days with UK-grown stone-milled flour. The Good Food Guide also names the brown butter madeleines, almond croissants and chewy chocolate-chip cookies, plus homemade marmalades and Leeds honey.

There is no seating, but you can watch the dough being kneaded while you wait. The homepage lists Wednesday to Friday 8am to 2:30pm and Saturday and Sunday 9am to 2:30pm, closed Monday and Tuesday. Older hours still show on other pages and on Facebook, so check before you go. Sourdough is baked Thursday to Sunday, with none on Wednesdays, so plan around that. If you live nearby, a four-week bread subscription starts at £14 for one loaf a week.

More on the accolade in the Yorkshire Evening Post and the Good Food Guide review.

The Underground Bakery, Call Lane

7 Call Lane, LS1 7DH, next to the Corn Exchange. It started as a wholesale operation in the basement of co-owner Ash Lees's house, run with Marcus Fisk, then opened a shop in Otley in 2022. The Call Lane site opened in May 2024 in the former Bad Apples rock bar.

What to order: croissants, cruffins, sourdough baguettes and sea-salt focaccia, with Casa Espresso coffee. Reviewers praise the almond croissant, the cinnamon bun and the sourdough, and mention pecan cinnamon buns and a cheese and Marmite swirl. Leeds List has described Sunday-morning queues down Call Lane, so go early or go midweek.

Listings disagree on opening hours, some saying 8am to 3pm daily and others a shorter week, so check the bakery's own website before you go. Background in Leeds List.

Bluebird Bakery, Kirkgate Market

The stall is at the top of Fish Row, off New York Street, in Leeds Kirkgate Market. It is a family-run real bread bakery that started in York, where the bread is baked, and it now has six sites across Yorkshire. Stall hours are 9am to 3pm Monday to Saturday, closed Sunday.

What to order: the cinnamon buns, if they are in, according to Leeds List. It also picks out the olive, pepper and jalapeño focaccia, the ciabatta, the Bengali five-spice roll and the brownies. A sourdough loaf has been reported at nudging £5, and the stall often sells out by early afternoon, so get there before lunch. One reviewer said the stall refused cash, so have a card handy.

The market itself is open Monday to Wednesday 8am to 5:30pm and Thursday to Saturday 7:30am to 5:30pm, and closed on bank holidays except Good Friday. More from Leeds List and the Bluebird website.

Leeds Bread Co-op, Meanwood

An independent sourdough bakery run as a workers' co-op in Meanwood. The website lists opening Tuesday to Friday 8am to 2pm and Saturday 9am to 1pm. Click and collect runs on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and the online shop lists a cinnamon bun, a croissant and a deli rye sourdough. Home delivery covers certain postcodes only. See the online shop for what is on.

Planning your bakery run

• Nova is closed Monday and Tuesday, and there is no sourdough on Wednesdays.
• Bluebird and The Underground Bakery sell out or queue, so go early.
• For a cinnamon bun, The Underground Bakery, Bluebird and Leeds Bread Co-op are your options here.
• Hours drift, so look at each bakery's own site before you cross town.