It is Friday at noon and Crystal Palace is stifling in the June sunshine. Outside a bakery, a queue stretches for almost half a mile towards Anerley. But that’s nothing here: one customer drove down from Leicester to try it; another couple took a flight in from New York. Welcome to Chatsworth Bakehouse.
In real life, Chatsworth is a diminutive hub of focaccia-based creativity, almost unassuming, but online it is a giant. It operates a weekly changing menu, serving sandwiches between Wednesdays and Fridays, and each Monday, as soon as a new £10 sandwich is announced on Instagram, the bakery sells out in under a minute — more than 150 every day. Competition is fierce: TikTok foodie @overfilteredovereaten set five alarms, took a day off work, delayed her house move and travelled three hours on six trains to grab one.
It is hype that has been building, gradually, since 2020, when Croydon-born founders Tom Mathews and Sian Evans were left twiddling their thumbs in the belligerent humdrum of lockdown. Mathews, a chef at a loose end, and Evans, in the music industry and working remotely with much less to do, started baking bread and filling slices with all manner of culinary finery.
Orders were delivered first by foot, then by bike, and later by a team of drivers, such was the immediate popularity. Soon, a website had to be built and Evans was left managing multiple spreadsheets as demand surged to a near insurmountable degree.
“It really did get out of control quite quickly,” Evans tells the Standard. “We started out with all these leftover ingredients from Tom, and then suddenly we had a serious business on our hands.”
Since then, Chatsworth has only ploughed on. It is the power of social media, no doubt — Evans is skilled with hype building — but also the elaborate combinations of flavours dreamt up by Mathews.
One TikToker set five alarms, took a day off work and delayed her house move just to grab one
On that Friday afternoon, customers enjoyed a “tuna sandwich”, one well beyond its name. Sustainable, line-caught fish is mixed with basil and garlic aioli, smashed artichokes delirious with Calabrian chilli, wild rocket and pickled shallots. It is inspired and extraordinary; it puts all other versions to shame. The focaccia? There may be none finer in the city.
Elsewhere, cured meats and pickles, hot sauces and cheeses are meticulously combined. The “Anerley Hill Hot” is perhaps the most coveted. Inside is an eclectic mix that reads excessively, but my god, works: Fennel salami, Napoli salami, prosciutto crudo, chilli pepper spread, garlic sauce, provolone, pickled fennel, bitter leaves, and a hot honey dressing are lavished inside that oil-drenched, mattress-like bread.
What do the pair make of all the drama? What about the guy doing a six-hour trip from Leicester? “He drove down, said hello, ate his sandwich, and drove home,” shrugs Evans. “We’ve had some people tell us they’ve waited around four months to successfully land one [of our sandwiches]. Our online store crashes with the amount of people trying to order and we’re always left with a waiting list.
“We have queues every day, but lots of walk-ins, too. We don’t just want to be a frenzy and driven by social media, as great as that is. We’re a community bakery and we love to see locals come in, and regulars. We’re a small team and we sell freshly baked loaves of bread, cookies, and we encourage people to come in for a chat and have a drink.”
And if those people aren’t all crashing the website and spilling down the road? Evans smiles. “We love that we’re popular, obviously. It’s great and we do have some grand(ish) ideas. But we’re also happy just making sandwiches and just grateful that so many people think they’re delicious.”
