For many Singaporeans who like shopping in Johor Bahru, Lavender Bakery & Patisserie is a popular pit stop to tapow cheap and delicious bakes before heading home. The Malaysian bakery chain, founded in 2000, has 12 outlets in JB and Kuala Lumpur. And recently, it opened its first Singapore outlet at Jewel Changi Airport’s basement.

Why did it take so long for Lavender Bakery to come here, given its popularity with Singaporeans? “We had to find a good location,” says its Johor-based founder, Wendy Thien, 56. And the Jewel mall, with its constant stream of local and international visitors, proved irresistible.

The stylish but low-profile matriarch (we can see why the rustic, French-style branding for Lavender is so chic) runs the business with her three equally stylo kids: son Tam Yong Wen, who’s the chief operating officer, daughter Tammy Tam, the chief product officer (who are both in their mid-30s) and youngest daughter Vera Tam, in her 20s, the assistant operation manager. The affable Wendy tells us that her husband founded the other insanely popular bakery chain in Malaysia called Season Bakery & Cafe, before selling it to another owner.

The takeaway Jewel outlet is open-concept and looks inviting, with a pretty, swirling layout that overlooks the Rain Vortex waterfall. Half of the space is dedicated to the bakery, where you can grab a tray and choose your favourite buns, while the other half is the patisserie with birthday cakes displayed tantalisingly in a glass case. Some of the goodies are also beautifully packaged, and are meant to be given as gifts. The outlet is in the process of applying for halal certification.

When it gets crowded with customers, as it inevitably does, the shop can feel pretty claustrophobic. One evening, we were edged out of the way by an enthusiastic auntie dragging her grandson towards some buns while shouting: “Boy ah! Can buy this for your breakfast tomorrow!” Our suggestion: drop by in the morning, when the shop opens at 10am, ’cos most of the popular items are sold out in the afternoon.

Despite being located very near the 24-hour A&W outlet at Jewel, Lavender Bakery is only open till 10pm daily. “It’s very tiring for our workers to work through the night, and we want them to be able to go home and spend time with their families. It’s the same for our staff in Malaysia,” explains Wendy.

For folks who don’t wanna spend time trekking to JB or risk being stuck in the soul-sucking Causeway jam, Lavender Bakery at Jewel is wonderfully convenient. Almost all of their repertoire in Malaysia is available in Singapore. But here’s the bad news: the prices here are about two to three times higher across all products too. “The rent, salaries and operational costs are higher here than in Malaysia. We’re also using Singapore dollars [which is three times the value of Malaysia’s ringgit currency],” explains Yong Wen, Lavender’s chief operating officer.

As most of the buns, cakes and bread loaves are freshly baked daily at the on-site kitchen, the company also has to import ingredients into Singapore for their wares. During our visit, we spied workers hauling big bunches of pandan leaves into the kitchen, which Tammy says are “hand-squeezed into pandan juice” to make the bakery’s popular pandan chiffon cakes. All of the shop’s baked goods are made with Japanese flour and French butter. “We also get a Japanese trainer to train our [pastry chefs],” adds Wendy. “The chefs [at Jewel] are local hires, but we send them to our headquarters in Johor for a month of training.”

We did a price comparison at Breadtalk (which is Lavender’s neighbour at Jewel), and found the prices for both bakeries more or less similar. Simply put, Lavender Singapore is still reasonably affordable by local standards, unless you’re a frequent JB shopper who’s already spoilt by Malaysia’s insanely cheap prices.

So we’ve come up with a list below of the top five worthiest picks from Lavender Bakery that you should just buy at Jewel, ’cos the time that you saved from avoiding the Causeway jam is worth the higher prices here (time is money, after all).

BUY THESE: ​​​​​​​

This is the one item we always stock up on whenever we are at a Lavender Bakery in JB. The petite, palm-sized loaf spiked with Japanese charcoal powder costs RM5 ($1.60) there. But we’ll still pay S$3 for it here ’cos it’s so darn yummy: fluffy, fragrant and fabulous when eaten on its own or toasted and topped with a smear of Lavender’s house-made lemak kaya spread ($4 a jar here).

You can get this dainty soufflé cheesecake bar in gift boxes of four or six pieces, ’cos it’s really hard to stop at eating just one piece. It boasts a soft, airy cream cheese centre (hanjuku means ‘half-cooked’ in Japanese) baked till it’s brown on top. Satisfyingly rich and not too sweet. It’s also very small; we finished ours in two chomps.

This sweet Milanese bread loaf that resembles a tall cake is traditionally eaten to celebrate Christmas. It’s available all year round at Lavender Bakery, and is stuffed with a citrusy medley of juicy rum-soaked raisins, orange peel and lemon zest. Sweeter than your usual bread, though it’s not too jelak. It looks pretty dense at first sight, but it has a light, softly chewy texture. We also like that the panettone comes in a gorgeous, house-shaped royal purple box. But get this quickly before it disappears from the shelves; as the owners are applying for halal certification for the bakery and patisserie, certain products like this boozy rum-infused panettone are deemed unsuitable for sale. “We might reintroduce it in the near future if there’s a right raw material substitution,” says assistant ops manager Vera.

Lavender’s version of the layered kueh cake is not bad at all; the slices we got are rich and dense, and taste of quality butter. You can buy it as a whole cake ($50), half a cake ($28) or as individually packaged slices in a box ($20 for 10 slices).

The birthday cakes at the patisserie here look very elegant and expensive, so we are surprised that a whole cake costs only $38, which is pretty much the same as what you’d pay at a neighbourhood bakery. This matcha-flavoured number is made with matcha powder from the city of Uji near Kyoto, Japan that’s famous for producing the land’s finest matcha.

SKIP THESE:

Lavender’s pandan chiffon cakes are practically flying off the shelves at Jewel; only a few boxes were left when we dropped by on several visits. We wonder why, though. The pale green cake’s texture is nicely bouncy, but dry, and could do with a heavier dose of pandan juice. It doesn’t quite hit our spot, but even at a pricier $6 (it’s RM9.30, or about S$3 in JB), the cake is still one of the most wallet-friendly pandan chiffon cakes in Singapore, which might explain its popularity.

The pre-packaged pineapple tarts here come in tiny log shapes stuffed with a grated pineapple filling. The pastry is not buttery enough, and the filling is too sour for our liking. Since it’s such a high-calorie snack, we’d rather splurge our calorie count on a yummier tart.

Lavender has a good selection of European-style roti, including the oft-sold out Coffee Walnut and Orange Peel Chocolate loaves. Unlike traditional denser European bread, which are made for sturdier ang moh teeth, the bakes here are tweaked to have a softer crumb with a hard crust. “We are Asian, we don’t eat such hard bread,” quips Lavender’s founder Wendy Thien. This flaxseed cranberry bread is generously studded with bits of dried cranberries and flaxseeds, giving it a moreish crunch. Our Asian teeth is also grateful that it doesn’t have to gnaw aggressively at the piece of bread. But that said, it’s almost $7 for this bread here. Go to JB for the cheap thrill of eating this at half the price.

LOOK OUT FOR THESE IN FUTURE:

This gigantic cream choux puff costs RM4.20 in JB (about $1.40), and sells like hotcakes there. But it’s not available in Singapore, yet. Lavender’s chief operating officer Tam Yong Wen tells us the company is looking at offering the cream puffs once their Jewel operations settle down. We hope that happens soon, ’cos these babies are fab: a craggy, buttery shell piped with oozy vanilla custard cream.