Bishopthorpe: Coffee Pod nominated for Press Best Bakery

And Press readers have agreed, nominating her for our Best Bakery competition.

The Coffee Pod in Bishopthorpe has been nominated for the competition, which celebrates the best of the best in the area.

Readers can vote for the Best Bakery 2024 by picking up copies of The Press newspaper until Saturday, September 14, with the winner set to be announced the week of Monday, September 23.

Jeni Wood said she was “quite amazed” to be nominated by readers – particularly as she does not class her business as a bakery.

Jeni Wood, owner of The Coffee Pod in Bishopthorpe (Image: Supplied)

“I run the business on my own so it wouldn’t be feasible for me to bake everything, so using the best around makes sense,” she explained.

Jeni said she bakes pastries and sausage rolls that are supplied by local businesses, in addition to some cakes and sweet treats which she makes herself.

“But I wouldn’t class myself mainly as a bakery,” she admitted. “So, I’m very surprised.”

Despite this, she explained that, during the Coffee Pod’s first year, she ran bread baking workshops for children and also hosts cupcake and gingerbread decorating workshops during half terms.

Outside The Coffee Pod in Bishopthorpe (Image: Supplied)

She opened the Coffee Pod in April 2022 with 35 years of experience in the hospitality industry.

Her first job was running a coffee shop in the 1980s, then she went on to run restaurants and a fruit and vegetable wholesale.

But, Jeni said, she always had a “passion” to have her own coffee shop.

Pastel de natas from Lisbon on sale at The Coffee Pod in Bishopthorpe (Image: Supplied)

Her children went to school in Bishopthorpe and she also worked in Quantum Estate agents in the village, which is where her café now is.

Recommended reading:

• ‘We don’t want to be mediocre’: how this York bakery became one of the city’s best
• This ‘small business with a big heart’ is hoping to be crowned York’s best bakery
• These are the ten best bakeries in York, according to Press readers

“I used to think how it would look if it was a coffee shop and a few years down the line it actually happened,” Jeni explained.

People 'addicted' to sausage rolls sold at the business, says owner

Now she stocks products from small businesses and bakeries.

This includes sausage rolls made by M&K Quality Butchers in Bishopthorpe Road, which are a top seller.

“People are quite addicted to them,” Jeni said.

The sausage rolls made by M&K Quality Butchers in Bishopthorpe Road sold at The Coffee Pod (Image: Supplied)

She also stocks cakes by Mayas Cake’s, from York, and brownies by Brown and Blond brownies, from Leeds.

One of Coffee Pod’s most unique products is pastel de natas – Portuguese egg custard tart pastries – which come directly from a bakery in Lisbon called Sunrise patisserie.

“We are the only York-based shop they supply,” Jeni explained.