Chiltern Bakery & Cafe — Restaurant in Chiltern

Sadly we arrived at closing time (3pm on a Tuesday), but that did not stop the cafe staff from being really great to us.

There was a huge range of store made pies, sausage rolls and pasties as well as cakes.

In the end, the porato pie won for me, while my bride had the cauliflower and broccoli pie. Yep.. it sounds evil, but she said it was just beautiful.

I even spotted a Malteser cake...

The staff were.just brilliant and friendly.

Where... main street of Chiltern. About 24 min south of Wodonga.

A perfect place for a rest stop on the Hume between Melbourne and Sydney.

How to get there. Take the Chiltern exit, but keep the speed down as the 50kmh zone is close to the highway.

Toilet. Arriving off the freeway, there is a park on the right, next to the swimming pool... toilet on the left. Plenty of parking, including a couple of caravan spots. Main street is parallel parking.

Fuel. There is a servo in town. (Closed weekends) Nearest next is the big BP five minutes down the hume towards Wodonga.

Quirky sight. As you get to the stop sign about 30m through the intersection is a house with steel flowers in the garden.

The main street has knitted decorations for the festive season. That in itself is worth the trip. One of my photos has a knitted Angel and Santa on the crossing bollards.

Open 6am to 3pm seven days.

Would I go back? Hell yeah. This was my third trip... we did a 400km round trip just...

Really not impressed with the service at this place. Tried entering bakery on a mobility walker only to be confronted with a set of steps. My 82 year old husband dragged my walker up the stairs while I tackled the steps. The woman behind the counter just stared at us .. didn't assist and made it very obvious that she didn't give a damn. We placed our order. Asked for a flat white coffee only to be told by the young female staff member that they had run out of coffee. We decided on a pot of English Breakfast tea that we shared. To access seating people had to stand/move so we were able to sit. Even though we folded the walker it was a job to get to the table. We received the pot of tea only to find we didn't receive the English Breakfast tea we ordered. To add insult to injury two separate couples served after us were served cappuccino, half strength latte, etc. We have no idea why we couldn't order coffee. In the end we couldn't wait to exit the bakery. The service was atrocious! We won't...

Despite my strong support for local businesses, today's experience at Chiltern Bakery left me disappointed in the lack of compassion and community spirit offered.

With scorching 35-degree weather, we ventured into town with my 90+ year old grandmother. After confirming they were open, we painstakingly helped my frail grandmother up the steps in her pusher, only to be told by the staff that they needed to mop the dining room and insisted we eat outside (in the heat).

It would have been considerate to offer my grandmother a seat in the entrance for a brief respite, but unfortunately, that option wasn't extended. Faced with limited choices in the town, we reluctantly ordered some cold drinks and slice and spent the next 10 minutes navigating the stairs to return to our car.

While I acknowledge the cafe's need to close an hour later, a bit of understanding and compassion as we struggled up the stairs, exhausted and overheated, would have made a...