Established 1959 · Santacruz East · Mumbai

Baked
with
devotion.

Home to Mumbai's most coveted Christmas plum cake — and six decades of baking that the city has grown up with.

V
66 Years of
Baking
Vakola · Santacruz East · Mumbai
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Rich Plum Cake · Chicken Pattice · Banana Wafers · Dutch Truffle · Marzipan Plum · Croissants · Hazelnut Crunch · Chicken Strudal · Black Forest · Celebration Cakes · Rich Plum Cake · Chicken Pattice · Banana Wafers · Dutch Truffle · Marzipan Plum · Croissants · Hazelnut Crunch · Chicken Strudal · Black Forest · Celebration Cakes ·
1959 Year Founded
3rd Generation Owners
4.6★ Google Rating
20–22 Day Shelf Life — Plum Cake, No Preservatives

Vakola · Santacruz East

A hidden gem
Mumbai keeps
close to its chest

Nestled behind St. Anthony's Church on Vakola Pipe Lane, Vienna Bakery has been feeding generations of Mumbaikars since 1959. No advertising. No franchise. No fanfare. Only the scent of fresh bread drifting into the street, and a queue that forms every morning.

Today it is run by Tara Raj and Indu Natesan — granddaughters of the founder — who have kept everything exactly as it was, while quietly improving the craft behind the scenes.

01 Our History

From Kerala
to the heart
of Mumbai

In pre-Independence India, a young P.K. Appoo from Thrissur, Kerala moved to Bombay in search of a livelihood. He found work at a European-owned bakery called Vienna. In the late 1950s, as Europeans began leaving the country, the owner decided to shut shop — and offered to sell the machinery.

Appoo bought it. He opened his own bakery in Bandra and carried on with the same equipment and the same name. Vienna had found its second life — and its true soul.

The bakery moved over the years from Bandra to Kandivali, before finally settling in Vakola, where it has been for decades. "We began with breads and pavs," recalls Tara Raj. Vendors would load red boxes onto their bicycles and deliver door to door — the traditional pheriwala system through every lane in the neighbourhood.

"We are a low-margin business. Even a ₹5 price increase disappoints people — they tell us so directly. And we like it that way. This is a place built on relationships."

— Tara Raj, Third-Generation Custodian

1959
P.K. Appoo buys Vienna
A young Keralite acquires the bakery machinery from departing Europeans and sets up shop in Bandra. The name Vienna lives on.
1970s
P.A. Ramakrishnan joins
Appoo's son-in-law, a law graduate, expands into catering for Christian weddings. The Rich Plum Cake recipe is refined — more nuts, raisins, spices. Born around 1975, it becomes the bestseller.
1996
Jiji Ramakrishnan takes the helm
Tragedy strikes when Ramakrishnan passes away at 42. His wife Jiji steps in to run the business, joined by elder daughter Indu Natesan. Vienna expands to 11 outlets across Mumbai by the early 2000s.
2016
Tara Raj joins the family
Having studied craft baking at Sophia College, Tara joins her sister. The duo refines recipes using food science — reducing fat in puffs by 10% through better layering, introducing an eggless range.
Today
A living institution
40–50% of business now comes via Swiggy and Zomato. Yet customers still queue at the counter — especially in December, when the Christmas Plum Cake draws the entire city.
02 · The Plum Cake

Born in
1975.
Perfected
since.

₹450

800g · The Original

01
No rum — just raisins
Despite its deeply rum-like aroma, there is no rum in the cake. All flavour comes entirely from raisins, warm spices, and time. A detail that surprises every first-time buyer.
02
The Christmas recipe is different
The festive version gets an extra dash of orange flavour and more spices. Available year-round, but December's batch is something else entirely.
03
Minimal preservatives — real shelf life
Vienna's plum cake lasts 20–22 days. Not the six months commercial brands claim. Real ingredients leave no room for shortcuts.
04
Still warm in butter paper
Sometimes cakes leave the oven too hot to seal in plastic. People carry them home wrapped in butter paper. That freshness is what keeps them coming back every year.
05
Eggless version available
The Christmas tradition belongs to every table. Vienna bakes a full Eggless Plum Cake so no one is left out of the ritual.

Why Mumbai
queues every
Christmas

Every December, long queues begin forming on Vakola Pipe Lane, often spilling onto St Anthony Road. The reason is singular. Thousands of loaves are sold every day from the second week of December through the first week of January — and people still prefer coming in person, even when delivery is available.

01
Thousands of loaves a day
Tara Raj admits with a smile that they sell thousands of loaves every day during the festive season — though she won't give exact numbers. Demand runs from the second week of December through the first week of January.
02
People still queue in person
Even though Vienna is available in retail outlets across Mumbai and on delivery apps, customers travel from Bandra, Andheri, and South Mumbai just to buy directly from the counter on Vakola Pipe Lane.
03
Demand from the second week of December
The queue builds for weeks. It is not just a Christmas Eve rush — it is a sustained, month-long ritual that has repeated itself for over half a century without a single ad placed.
04
A 66-year ritual, unbroken
No marketing. No celebrity endorsements. No influencer campaigns. The plum cake has built its own legend entirely through taste and memory — passed from one generation to the next.
Indian Express · Dec 22 2025

"Around Town: What makes this 66-year-old Mumbai bakery's plum cake so coveted?"

By Heena Khandelwal — The Indian Express profiled Vienna Bakery and its third-generation custodian Tara Raj, tracing its journey from a Bandra pav shop to one of Mumbai's most beloved Christmas institutions.

Read the article ↗
Google Reviews

Loved by
Mumbai

4.4
2,357 Google Reviews
View all on Google ↗

Click the listing inside the map to read all reviews directly on Google

Come find
your next
favourite bite

Address

125, Vakola Pipe Lane
Behind St. Anthony's Church
Santacruz East, Mumbai 400055

Hours

Open daily except Tuesdays
Morning to Evening · Closed Tuesdays

Nearby

Near Grand Hyatt Hotel, Vakola

Phone & WhatsApp

+91 83694 59055
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Order Online

Zomato ↗

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