Felix Goodwin and Elena Nguyen, the couple behind one of Melbourne’s best-known gluten-free bakeries, are commencing a new chapter in Brunswick. On Saturday, 12th September, the founders of Kudo Bakery will open Itera, an all-day bakery, café and 26-seat dine-in venue at Ballarat Street.
The new bakery is independent from Kudo, but it brings together the ideas and relationships Goodwin and Nguyen have built since launching their original bakery. This time, they’re making room for customers to take a seat.
“We knew we needed more space to keep growing, and the new Brunswick location gives us the production space we’ve needed for a while, room for the team to work, and a space where we can offer a dine-in experience, rather than only take-away,” says Nguyen and Goodwin.
From Kudo to Itera
The name Itera comes from “to iterate”—to return, evolve and come full circle—which feels particularly apt for the couple.
Goodwin and Nguyen married shortly before founding Kudo. They had been days away from completing a kitchen for a custom cake business when Melbourne entered lockdown in 2020, forcing them to change direction.
Nguyen arrived in Melbourne in 2011 to study at Monash University before enrolling at Le Cordon Bleu in 2015. She met Goodwin while on placement in 2017. Goodwin had already spent 15 years working in professional kitchens, including three years in the Yarra Valley, three at Donovan’s and opening teams at Saigon Sally and Sunda.
Together, they went on to build Kudo around a house-made gluten-free flour blend, ambitious pastry and an approach that puts technique and flavour ahead of convention.
At Itera, however, they want the bakery to come first. The new venue will be gluten-free, but the founders would prefer it to be thought of simply as a bakery—one where exceptional ingredients and careful baking happen to produce food without gluten.
A menu shaped by three kitchens
Head chef Kelvin Ong, formerly of Society, leads Itera’s seasonal menu, drawing on Australian produce and the backgrounds of the team.
Nguyen brings her Vietnamese heritage, Goodwin brings years of restaurant-kitchen experience and Ong brings his Malaysian background. Travel has also made its way onto the menu.
That means a morning at Itera could start with Folded Eggs & ‘Nduja on baguette with labneh and fermented capsicum, move into a Spring Onion Potato Rosti with ricotta and buttermilk, or take a more unexpected turn with the Chicken Congee Pot Pie.
The latter combines two dishes particularly close to the founders, bringing together the pies Goodwin once cooked at Donovan’s with the congee Nguyen grew up eating.
There’s also a Corn & Cheese Rarebit with sourdough, Vegemite butter and Gruyère; a Tiger Prawn Burger with cod roe mayonnaise and mustard leaf; and a farmer’s plate piled with sourdough, prosciutto, cheddar, pickles, a soft-boiled egg, mixed leaves, smoked paprika and tomato butter.
For a lighter bite, there’s soy-marinated avocado with seeded loaf, smoked seaweed mayonnaise and furikake.
Fermentation at the gluten-free bakery
Much of Itera’s craft begins before the baking even starts. The bakery uses two sourdough starters. The first is the original starter Goodwin and Nguyen cultivated in early 2020, before Kudo even existed as a bakery.
The second is Sakadane, a natural starter associated with Japanese sake brewing. Made by fermenting cooked rice with koji, its enzymes break down starch nd protein in the dough—particularly useful in gluten-free baking, where structure can be difficult to achieve.
At Itera, Sakadane is used for the miche and a new range of sweet breads, creating a crumb the founders describe as sweeter and nuttier while helping it stay soft for longer.
Then there are the canelés. Itera will rotate through eight flavours, with permanent favourites including Vanilla & JimmyRum Oaked Rum, Jasmine Tea with peach ganache and fresh raspberry, Pandan and Taro Custard, and Star Anise and Coffee.
The pandan and taro version takes inspiration from the cake Nguyen’s grandmother baked throughout her childhood, while the star anise and coffee combination nods to bánh gan, a Vietnamese dessert.
From corn choux to salted coffee
One of Nguyen’s signatures is the Corn & Cheese Choux, which uses almost every part of the cob. The corn silk and inner husk are brewed into a traditional Vietnamese summer tea before being turned into a delicate jelly, while fresh corn juice goes into a parmesan and mozzarella custard and the remaining pulp is slowly cooked with condensed milk.
The pastry has become a superstar at Kudo, even earning a five-out-of-five rating from Marco Pierre White during a visit to the bakery.
Dine-in sweets include crème caramel with whipped cream, Pandan and Coconut Cake, Leatherwood Honey Cake, Mandarin and Fennel Choux and a Rhubarb and Yuzu Cheesecake Tart.
Single O supplies the coffee, alongside signature drinks including Uji matcha with housemade vanilla syrup, Genmaicha Latte and Cold Brew Latte topped with Salted Foam, inspired by the cà phê muối Goodwin and Nguyen discovered while travelling through Da Nang.
A Brunswick space built with help from regulars
The design continues the visual language of the original Kudo bakery, with architect Kei Kitayama of Denton Corker Marshall returning to the project.
Three large open timber circles divide the new space into Bakery, Pantry and Dine-In. Built by Trust Project, the circular forms were originally inspired by the shape of a canelé.
Some of the most personal details, meanwhile, have come directly from the bakery’s customers. Artist Jessie French of Other Matter, a longtime Kudo regular, designed the patterned film across the interior glazing. It acts as both a screen and signage.
Another regular, Melbourne costume designer Phillip Toole, designed the front-of-house chore jackets, taking inspiration from the building’s former life as a Hard Yakka factory.
Melbourne maker Conrad-S supplied furniture, with bar stools by Dowel Jones and dining chairs by Fenton & Fenton. The brand identity and packaging come from The Lab in Ho Chi Minh City, which the founders discovered while visiting family in Vietnam.
For a bakery that began when Melbourne’s lockdown forced two hospitality workers to rethink their plans, Itera represents a fitting next step, with more room to bake, more room to gather and a chance to turn everything they’ve learned along the way into something new.
Itera opens at 4A Ballarat Street, Brunswick, on Saturday, 12th September 2026. It will be open Wednesday to Monday, 9am to 4pm, with walk-ins only!
Moreover, to celebrate opening weekend, the team is offering a complimentary Single O coffee or Zen Wonders matcha with any purchase.
