Verbena Pastry & Bakery is a confectionery chain well-known for its wide range of affordable, visually-appealing Japanese-French inspired pastries, cakes and breads with very low sweetness. It has several outlets in Kulai and Johor Bahru with its headquarter in Bandar Putra of Kulai.
I learnt about Verbena after coming across one of its Kulai branches in Taman Sri Kulai Baru, the “new town” of Kulai, and it is named “Verbena Patisserie Shop”. After visiting the Kulai outlet and taking a liking to their wide range of delightful confections, I visited its other outlets in Sutera Mall and Bukit Indah whenever I was in their vicinity.
Verbena’s innovative pastries are really visually-appealing and I picked 4 on the first visit to the Kulai outlet:
Top-Left: The Korean-Style Garlic Bun is a garlic bun that is stuffed with light cream cheese. The use of real garlic bits on the soft bun with white sesame seeds, parsley, etc, gives the bun a nice garlicky aroma and flavours with the savoury cream cheese contributing a second burst of flavour. This is so good!
Top-Right: The Volcano Japan Cheese Bun has a flower-shape soft crust filled with cream cheese, covered with cheese and baked till crispy. It is a double cheesy delight.
Bottom-Left: The Sweet Potato Bread is a black bun, sprinkled with sweet potato powder, and filled with yellow sweet potato paste with big red beans. The bun is soft and fluffy with natural flavour of sweet potato and of low sweetness.
Bottom-Right: The Egg Tarts (2 pcs per box) have smooth, creamy custard in soft, crumbly short crust. The sweetness level is similarly very low yet not to the point of being tasteless.
Within Johor Bahru District, Verbena has outlets in Sutera Mall, Austin 18 and Bukit Indah. A new bus service from JB Sentral to Sutera Mall, introduced on 30 September 2025, created a convenient alternative to visit Verbena’s Sutera Mall outlet, which I visited several times.
Top-Left: The Chicken Stew Bun is a soft, squarish, fluffy bun filled with stewed chicken. The chicken meat, in a thickish dark sauce, has a firm texture with nice bites. It is not strong tasting and gives the bun a nice mellow flavour.
Top-Right: The Caterpillar Stick, which resembles a caterpillar, has strips of cheese laid on top of the bun and lightly baked. The cheese strips are still soft after baked. Sandwich in the bun is a layer of light cream, adding some flavours to it without sweetening it.
Bottom-Left: The no-knead Korean Bread has a cracky appearance with speckles of black sesame seeds on the thin crust and within. It is soft, yet with a very chewy texture that is so nice to chew on.
Bottom-Right: The Japanese Milk Roll is similar to the Volcano Japan Cheese Bun and has a baked cheese top, with a different pattern. It has milky cream in the cavity of the soft bun instead of cream cheese.
Top: The Mexican Bun is pretty lightweight and its top cookie crust is embedded with almond flakes, raisins and sprinkled with ultra-fine sugar. The interior of the soft bun contains savoury melted butter.
Bottom-Left: The BBQ Chicken Polo Bun has crispy top crust with white sesame seeds. It contains some chunky barbecue chicken with nice flavour with very low sweetness.
Bottom-Right: The Taro Bun is quite dense and heavy. It is stuffed full with taro paste that has a mellow taro flavour and not too sweet too. It can be quite hearty.
From top in clockwise direction:
The Black Pepper Chicken Bun is filled with small cuts of chicken meat with some biting textures, not using mashed chicken mixture that is usually softer and soggy. The bun has spiciness of black pepper and the rich falvour lingers in the mouth after eating.
A repeat of the Sweet Potato Bread — I have bought it several times.
The Petit Paris, or “French brioche with creme & chocolate”, is a cream puff with crunchy chocolate and sugar icing toppings. The puff is soft and airy and stuffed with light cream. Smaller in size and light, it is suitable as dessert after meals.
The Sardine Bun is another fluffy, squarish bun (similar to the Chicken Stew Bun) filled with sardine. The bun has light cream with some herb powder that add some flavours to the sardine.
The Japanese Bonito Bun has a layer of savoury sauce to bond the bonito flakes and sesame seeds to the top of the bun. Inside the soft bun is soft, chewy mochi with very light sweetness to balance the strong savoury taste of the toppings.
Verbena’s English Scones — available as standalone or 2 pieces in a box — are pre-spread with thick butter and jam, saving the need to add them ourselves. Infused with cranberries, the crumbly scones have buttery flavour with light sweetness of the cranberries and jam. It is definitely a must to try their scones — one is definitely not enough.
Verbena’s wide range of confections have varying textures and are very low in sweetness, yet have nice flavours — they are popular with many elderlies too who often shun away from sweet confections and pastries. Unless otherwise made known, the confections that I have tried and listed above should be available in all outlets.
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Address #1:
12, Jalan Susur Kulai 4, Taman Sri Kulai Baru, 81000 Kulai, Johor, Malaysia
Opening Hours:
9am to 7pm | Daily
How to Get There:
Take BAS.MY J30 from JB Sentral to Kulai Bus Terminal and change to BAS.MY J300 / CityBus 2. Read: JB Bus / Train: To Kulai District in Johor (柔佛.古来).
Address #2:
Sutera Mall, L2-550A (near main entrance)
Jalan Sutera Tanjung 8/4, Taman Sutera Utama, 81300 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia
Opening Hours:
11am to 9:30pm | Daily
How to Get There:
Take BAS.MY J34 from JB Sentral to Sutera Mall. Read: JB Bus: To Beletime Danga Bay / Angsana Mall / Paradigm Mall / Sutera Mall along Skudai Highway.
Address #3:
8, Jalan Indah 15/2, Taman Bukit Indah, 81200 Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia
Opening Hours:
11am to 8:30pm (Sunday till 8pm) | Daily
How to Get There:
Take BAS.MY J33 from JB Sentral to Bukit Indah. Read: JB Bus: To AEON Mall Bukit Indah & Perling Mall.
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