OWL Bakery West Asheville — Restaurant in Asheville

OWL (Old World Levain) Bakery is always great, and sometimes, is exceptional. Side by side with pastries I've eaten on travels all over Europe and beyond, the offerings from OWL are a cut above (yes, even including those from France).

Susannah Gebhart & Nancy Hughes (and the rest of the OWL team) continue to deliver on beautifully nuanced, European inspired pastries.

My particular favorite is the Cardamom Bun ($5), with the slightly sticky and delectable texture of an enriched dough pull-apart or Kardemummabulle and the open crumb structure of a brioche. It is glazed with subtle and delicious fennel & orange, and topped with chunky (crunchy) sugar like brioche au sucre. This is all finished by a perfectly big punch of freshly ground cardamom.

The bake and finish on these can be a little inconsistent, unfortunately, but still worth the wait in line and price point. Such inconsistencies include: over caramelized (read burnt) bottoms, over sweet, inconsistent amounts of fennel and orange, or too tight a wrap which retards the rise and can leave the center under or gummy.

Still, that said, fantastic and landing a solid score of 7.8/10 on average, and 9.5/10 on the best of days!!

I'd be remiss to not mention how exceptional and complex the quiche always is with a perfect crumb (but Susannah, I miss the salad with pickled onions!).

OWL makes my top five bakery list world-wide and is the only bakery in the United States yet to do so.

You haven't done Asheville without a wait in line at OWL.

Review from @therouxreview...

Bad quality, long lines, and high prices. I can't believe this place is popular. I went there because my wife sent me to pickup up two baguettes. I arrived at 9:40 and stood in the shoulder to shoulder line for 20 minutes. When I got to the register, the young lady at the counter told me the baguettes will be delivered at 11:30. What? Delivered?

Anyway, I was there with my daughter so I ordered an almond croissant and a chocolate croissant. They were $4.00 each. In France, a croissant is 1 euro. Both our croissants were cold, stale and bad quality. My daughter wouldn't even finish hers. They really tasted as if they were made the day before and were overcooked and dried out.

The entire time I was in this very crowded place, I didn't notice anyone bussing tables, even though everyone tips at the register. We cleaned our own table and left. On the way out, I noticed several tables full of crumbs.

Obviously, Asheville is sorely lacking a good quality bakery. For this place to be as popular and well rated as it is, can only be a testament to how badly folks want a good...

Stoked we were able to grab some pastries this morning before hitting the road! Arrive 10 minutes before they opened and was 6th in line. By the time we left there were probably 10 people in line behind us!

They are operating a walk up window system and asking their guests to mask up! There was plenty of outdoor seating but we took ours to go!

Service was quick and friendly. Everything we ordered was delicious and I even grabbed a tote! We had the following pastries:

Morning Bun - absolutely must order Sweet Danish - strawberry was fantastic Ham & Cheese Croissant- Yummmmm Lemon Tart - BEAUTIFUL!!! Pastelito - perfect combo of guava paste and cream cheese

We also snagged a piece of quiche which had spring onions and was super tasty as well!

Definitely recommend visiting this bakery! My partner has a coffee with cream and their vanilla cardamom syrup which I’m assuming they make in house. We saw some of the bread going out, and regretted our decision to purchase bread before we left for our trip!

Thank you Owl Bakery for making delicious food for your...