Baking and high country go together like the alps and adventure sports. Victorian High Country is home to Ned Kelly, a thriving wine region, one of the best rail trails in the country and some amazing bakeries.

Nestled in the foothills of the Australia Alps, you’ll find the towns of Victorian High Country. It’s the kind of place where you can just about hear the echoes of nineteenth century gold miners bounce off the quaint old buildings.

Whether it’s cyclists flying past on an alpine breeze on the Murray to Mountains Rail Trail, or workers lining up for a midday pie and vanilla slice, these beautifully preserved towns still bustle with the energy on which they were founded.

Join us on a road trip around Victorian High Country as we tuck into the baked goods on offer along the way.

1/ Silver Creek Sourdough

The historic gold mining town of Beechworth is home to Silver Creek Sourdough. Operating since 2014, the bakery uses traditional bread making techniques, sourdough culture and quality ingredients to handcraft their loaves. Their flours are organic, and Australian grown and processed, and the loaves contain only flour, salt, water plus a few tasty extras such as herbs, fruit and honey.

The bakery is also known for their handmade sourdough crumpets and par-baked pizza bases.

Owner Louise Ritchie opened the bakery after being made redundant in a previous role. After spending time perfecting her sourdough technique, opening the bakery was the next logical step. A You Tube and recipe-book trained home baker, Louise loves making bread but loves knowing the people buying her bread even more.

Our pick: Sourdough crumpets

2/ Milawa Bakery

East of Wangaratta on the way to Mount Buffalo and the slopes of Mount Beauty is the town of Milawa. Visitors here enjoy locally sourced produce while overlooking snow-capped mountains in the distance. Inside, you’ll often find prints on the walls for sale by local artists.

The famous Milawa Bakery Café sits along Myrtleford Road (also know as the Snow Road) and attracts visitors with its range of gourmet pies, sausage rolls, cakes and freshly baked artisanal bread.

Once you’ve parked your bike in the oversize bicycle rack out the front, head inside for a warm coffee or beer (this bakery is licensed) while you deliberate over your choice of food.

The bread here isn’t made by Milawa Bakery but is baked by Milawa Bread, a nearby local artisanal bakehouse. The long-fermented bread is made from grains from growers from Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia. The loaves, which contain no preservatives or additives, come in three categories: semi-sourdough, sourdough and Viennoiserie.

Our pick: Nan’s sponge

3/ High Country Bakehouse

Daryle Williams and Irene Williams along with daughter Jade, have owned and run High Country Bakehouse in the town of Mansfield since 2002. Here, they make everything from pies, sausage rolls, and pasties to jam tarts and a range of breads.

“Mansfield is full of the best home grown country cooks,” Irene says.

“We have to compete with Grandma’s cooking and that’s the kind of food we love to cook: good old-fashion comfort food.”

Along with its sourdough (try the white cottage sourdough loaf) and pies, the bakehouse is also known for its white chocolate cheesecake. The team first made the cheesecake after receiving a 10kg box of white chocolate instead of the one-kilogram packet they had ordered. It’s now a firm favourite with customers.

Irene adds, “There’s never a dull moment in Mansfield,” and cites bush walking, wine tasting, rodeos and racing as just some of what the town has to offer.

Our pick: White chocolate cheesecake

4/ Gum Tree Pies

Six years ago, Yackandandah couple Sebastian and Melinda Nedziak closed Gum Tree Café and reopened as Gum Tree Pies. They’d been selling pies in the café and found them so popular (the pies were keeping the café afloat) they decided to ditch everything else on the menu.

The pies, which can be bought ready to eat or cold to take and bake, come in flavours such as Steak and Red Wine, Steak and Guinness, Steak and Pepper Pie, and Panang Curry Pumpkin. Also on offer are sausage rolls, cakes, milkshakes and coffee.

Gum Tree Pies has won gold, silver and bronze at the Great Aussie Meat Pie Competition and, because of their ongoing success, they opened a second store in Bright in July.

Our pick: Lamb and mint jelly pie

5/ Beechworth Bakery

Beechworth Bakery is a bit of an institution in Victorian High County. The chain, which also has bakeries in Echuca, Albury, Bendigo, Ballarat and Healesville, is home to cakes, pastries, breads and pies, including the legendary Ned Kelly pie (a hearty steak pie topped with bacon, cheese and a whole egg) and Snickerdoodle (a butter shortbread shell filled with baked custard and topped with berries).

The bakery in Beechworth has been around since 1984 and it’s the location where the mega successful chain first opened its doors. Inside, you’ll find chocolate eclairs, custard tarts and lamingtons as solid and time-tested as the history of the town.

Don’t leave Beechworth Bakery without trying a Beesting. The sweet bun is chock full of custard and finished with toffeed almonds that you’ll enjoy licking off your fingers.

Our pick: Beesting bun

6/ Café Derailleur

Just across from the Wangaratta Railway Station is a funky little café you won’t want to miss. Popular with locals, tourists, and cyclists, Café Derailleur offers all-day breakfasts, lunches, cakes, muffins and coffee.

On the menu you’ll find fruit sourdough toast and house-made bread with the soup of the day.

“We make our own bread, which is a harder way to do things but it gives us more flexibility,” owner Eric Bittner says.

While the delicious offerings on the menu are worth a visit alone, it’s the coffee that Café Derailleur has become famous for. They use Coffee Supreme beans and have a grinder dedicated to decafs to order, so you can enjoy an afternoon coffee without sacrificing sleep. Café Derailleur has an impressive range of hot drinks on the menu, including a blend of coffee beans to complement non-milk coffees.

Our pick: Matcha latte with almond milk

7/ Hide’s Bakery

Whether you’re stopping in at Benalla to visit the gliding club, the Benalla Art Gallery or just for a break in your road trip along the Hume Highway, Hide’s Bakery is a must. Situated on the main street, the bakery attracts locals and visitors with its range of gourmet pies, focaccias, sandwiches, cakes, pastries, breads and coffee.

The vanilla slice at Hide’s bakery is famous in these parts and when you see the generous size, the layers of flaking pastry, the fluffy icing and dense yellow custard, you’ll know why.

While the bakery has a warm, high-country interior where you can sit alongside an old oven and dough trough, we recommend grabbing a coffee and vanilla slice and enjoying them among the roses in the nearby Benalla Botanical Gardens or by the shores of tranquil Lake Benalla.

Our pick: Vanilla slice

8/ Boonderoo Farm Bakery

A feature on Victorian High Country bakeries is not complete without a mention of Boonderoo Farm. Thomas and Gabi Moritz spend their time milling and baking bread and pastries to supply local restaurants and farmers markets.

The micro bakery specialises in sourdough and rye breads, along with European pastries (think brioche and strudel). They mill their own flour onsite in an Austrian stone mill, and all of their breads and desserts are baked in their wood-fired oven.

On the menu you’ll find white, wholemeal and rye sourdough; herb sticks; Gypsy bread; raisin bread; brioche; hazelnut and poppy seed strudel; hazelnut scrolls; cheese sticks; and muffins.

Find offerings from Boonderoo Farm Bakery at the Hume Murray Food Bowl, Moyhu Market and Colmie Market or taste them on the farm yourself when you stay in their on-farm accommodation.

Our pick: It’s a tie between hazelnut strudel and white sourdough

9/ Bertalli’s Bakery Benalla

The Bertalli family has been baking in Victoria since 1936 when Dick Bertalli founded Alpine Breads. Now, the bakery in Benalla still bakes and distributes the Alpine Breads range to Victorian Woolworths, Coles and independent stores under Dick’s grandson Andrew, who continues to expand the business and range of breads.

Andrew Bertalli took over Bertalli’s Bakery in Benalla in 2008 and says baking is in his blood. The bakery stocks a full range of pies and cakes, fresh rolls and sandwiches, scones and wraps, plus an award-winning vanilla slice, but it’s the bread that Bertalli’s is most famous for.

Bertalli’s Bakery is attached to the Alpine Breads production line, which bakes FODMAP-friendly certified bread, high-protein breads for athletes, and heart breads that can help with lowering cholesterol.

Our pick: Wild Alpine artisan dark rye bread