This Iconic East Bay Bakery Has Closed After Nearly 100 Years in Business

Longtime Taste of Denmark customers like Wayne Young got some sad news over the weekend: the Telegraph Avenue bakery, which opened in 1929, has closed permanently as of Sunday, October 23. Young told KPIX he’d been shopping for cashew curls and butterscotch bites at the Oakland bakery, which specialized in treats like Scandinavian butter cookies and German chocolate cake, since he was five years old. According to KPIX, inflation and high rent costs are the cause of death for the storied business — even after rising prices on its goods. “Customers didn’t really mind the price increases,” co-owner Ramon Luna says. “It’s that the price increases didn’t really help us because cost of ingredients kept going up and up.”

SFGATE reports Danish immigrant George Neldam launched and ran the business for the first 80 years, though it was then known as Neldam’s. That first chapter ended in 2010; then a group of employees reopened the bakery under Luna’s leadership as Taste of Denmark. Employees were told of the shuttering alongside customers, only learning of the closure on Friday, October 21. Longtime employee Erik Burnette told the outlet that customers have a hard time understanding why so many longtime businesses are folding so long after what felt like the worst of COVID’s impact. “It’s hard to understand the workings of the economy,” Burnette said. “But they just have a feeling that something is not right.”

Popular donut shop to expand outside of San Francisco

Bob’s Donuts, a San Francisco classic, is headed outside city limits for the first time as the business expands to Mill Valley and San Jose. The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the first of the two new locations will be at 252 Almonte Boulevard in Mill Valley and is expected to open by the end of October, followed by a Santana Row location to debut at some point in 2023.

Peninsula Hawaiian Japanese brunch outlet returns this week

Morning Wood, Chad and Monica Kaneshiro’s testament to big plates of loco moco and kalua katsu sandwiches, opens for the first time in two years on Wednesday, October 26 at its new home, 514 Peninsula Avenue in . The San Francisco Chronicle reports the new location has about 80 seats and new dishes on the menu, like a riff on bacon and eggs and panko and corn flake-encrusted French toast.

Ferry Building-based food nonprofit to host food pop-up event

Foodwise, a San Francisco food advocacy organization, is hosting 10 local Black-owned food businesses at the Ferry Building on Saturday, October 29. The free-to-attend event will run from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. and feature businesses including upscale lemonade stand Gourmanade and Jamaican food outlet Peache’s Patties.

San Francisco distillery and bakery team up for new collab

Seven Stills, the Mission Bay-based brewery and distillery, linked with Third Culture Bakery for a mango passion fruit mochi donut sour ale, which was released on October 24 for sale at the Seven Stills distillery and brewery. Do not try and say it three times fast or anything cute like that.