Loud crust,slow crumb.
Sourdough that spent three days getting ready for you, pastries folded before sunrise, and one cardamom bun that people set alarms for. Downtown Cleveland, Tennessee, Wednesday to Sunday, until the shelves are bare.
Today's bake board
Updated 6:40am. Times are what usually happens, not a promise.
- Country loafusually gone by 10:30
- Seeded ryeusually gone by 11:00
- Olive and rosemaryusually gone by 9:45
- Butter croissantusually gone by 9:15
- Ham and gruyère croissantusually gone by 9:00
- Rosemary focacciausually lasts till close
- Cardamom-cinnamon bunweekends, gone by 8:30
Heels are free with any loaf if you ask nicely. Day-old bread is half price Thursday after 10.
How the board works
We bake once, early, and we bake what the ovens can hold. Nothing gets held back for a second rush, so the board is honest about when things tend to disappear.
Want a guarantee? Pre-order below and we'll put your name on a bag before the doors open.
The weekend bun
Cardamom-cinnamon, laminated with cultured butter, about the size of a softball. We make 90 on Saturdays and 110 on Sundays. The line forms at 6:45. We're not going to make more; the oven won't fit them.
Pre-order for pickup
Pick what you want, pick a morning, and it'll be bagged with your name on it. Pay at the counter. Orders close at 6pm the evening before.
Meet Dolores.
Every loaf here starts with a jar of flour, water and whatever wild yeast was floating around a Knoxville apartment kitchen in 2014. She came with us when we moved. She has survived two power outages, one move across a state line and a week in a cooler during a kitchen remodel.
She's a stiff, mostly-wheat starter with a little rye in her diet. She smells like green apples when she's happy and like nail polish when she's hungry. We try not to let her get hungry.
Feeding schedule
- 5:30am
- 1 part Dolores, 5 parts flour, 4 parts water, 78°F
- 4:00pm
- same again, then into the walk-in overnight
- Mondays
- she gets a day off. So do we.
Fourteen years on the line. Then a jar.
Marisol worked the line at restaurants in Knoxville and Chattanooga for fourteen years, mostly sauté, mostly nights. Somewhere in there she started baking bread on her days off because it was the only thing in a kitchen that didn't need to be done in four minutes.
In 2022 she rented the old Hinkle's hardware storefront on Ocoee Street, put a deck oven where the paint mixer used to be, and opened the door at 7 with eleven loaves. They were gone by 8. The name comes from the second proof, the one where the dough finally looks like it knows what it's doing.
"Bread is just patience you can eat. I was never patient. The dough made me."
There are four of us now. Nobody has a title. Whoever is tallest gets the top rack.
Allergens, and what's in our kitchen
We're a small, one-room bakery with one mixer and one set of sheet pans. We'd rather be straight with you than vague.
- Everything we make contains wheat. We don't have a gluten-free option and we can't safely make one in this room.
- Pastries, buns and cookies contain dairy and eggs. The plain loaves (country, rye, olive, focaccia) don't, but they're baked in the same oven.
- We handle tree nuts (pistachio, almond, walnut) and sesame most days. Traces can end up anywhere.
- The ham croissant contains pork and mustard.
If you have a serious allergy, call us at (423) 555-0118 before you order and ask for Marisol or Dev. We'll tell you exactly what touched what that morning.
Come early. Bring cash or don't, we take cards.
Hours
- Mondayclosed
- Tuesdayclosed
- Wednesday7am until sold out
- Thursday7am until sold out
- Friday7am until sold out
- Saturday7am until sold out
- Sunday7am until sold out
"Sold out" is usually somewhere between 11 and 1. Weekends, earlier.
Good to know
Street parking on Ocoee is free before 9. There's a lot behind the building that belongs to the dentist; he's fine with it on weekends.
Coffee is from a small roaster in Chattanooga, drip only, $2.50, refills free while you're in the shop.
Dogs on the sidewalk tables get a heel. Also free.