Café Olya

At Café Olya, there is magic in serendipity. Unsuspecting customers walk through the door and are overtaken by the powerful attraction found only between a hungry stomach and an early-morning bite of exquisite baked goodness.

But it needs to happen by accident. That’s why it’s magic, because the spell can be broken: if a customer arrives demanding a dozen croissants, they will be turned away, if someone wants the lemon square they had last week, they will be disappointed. The baked goods change daily (often scones, biscuits, Gruyere cheese puffs, but rarely with the same flavours or accents), and are baked in small batches, meant to sell out by noon.

Everything is handmade, from scratch, and absolutely divine, but owner Mike Tasso underscores that the scale of production is very small, meant for about one treat per customer, not massive orders. “We’re a take-out coffee shop that just happens to do our own baking,” he notes.