Marcel Bakery is a bakery on Botany Road in Botany Downs, Auckland, rated 4.0. A good bakery is usually obvious from the smell, since bread and pastries baked on site rather than trucked in from elsewhere fill the shop with a smell that a reheated product never quite matches. Getting there early tends to mean the best selection, since popular items like fresh bread or a particular pastry can sell out well before closing, leaving slimmer pickings later in the day. Bread made with a slower proof generally has more flavour and keeps better over a few days than a quickly proofed loaf, so it's worth asking what's baked fresh that morning versus held over from earlier batches. Regulars tend to build a routine around a bakery, popping in on the way to work rather than treating it as a special trip. On Botany Road in Botany Downs, Marcel Bakery is a local option for that kind of everyday baking.