When I was a kid, I loved to play house, though I was never especially interested in the husband-and-child portion of the game. Funny now, considering I have both and am pleased as punch with the arrangement.
What I wanted was the house.
I wanted a room that belonged to me. I wanted to move the furniture around, decide what pretend cakes we were serving, and choose who was invited. Very middle-child behavior: Please come to my party. I have made everything as nice as possible on a budget of nothing. Also, I reserve the right to yell for mom if you make fun of me.
My grandparents had a strange unfinished space above their two-car garage that I discovered one very boring afternoon. It was a wooden platform with two windows, a few mostly broken chairs, an old school desk, dusty tables, and boxes nobody needed but nobody wanted to throw away. It had at least a decade of dust on it and was emphatically not a place for children.  Naturally, I decided it was mine.
I snuck bowls, plates, utensils, and the odd tchotchke upstairs from my grandparents’ house and arranged the space into my version of a clubhouse. My grandmother, of course, eventually noticed and made sure I returned everything. But the vision remained.
Up there I would throw imaginary parties and work the counter at my imaginary bakery. I stirred imaginary batters in very real bowls and served invisible customers. Sometimes my older sister played along until she had the nerve to get bored and leave. Understandable but I had an imaginary business to run.
I hadn’t thought about that room much until recently – because I finally built it!
In 2016, I started The Bakehouse NOLA inside my double-shotgun house in the Bywater. A dozen people would come over and we’d make pies, decorate cakes, and become surprisingly fast friends.
I was teaching baking classes, sure, but I was really making a room.
Two, nearly three years ago now, I moved to Bellville, Texas, and into an old Victorian house built in 1888. A very different vibe, to be sure, but the Gemini in me loves to live many different lives in one. Behind the big leaning house in the very small town is a garage with a workshop that the previous owners had filled with enormous worktables and tools for tending to the old house.
I very much need a room for tools – the house is always begging for attention in one way or another, but when I first walked into that workshop, I saw a corner I could tuck an oven into. A little sink surrounded by butcher block counters. A signed picture of George Straight on the wall. I saw the roll-up door open to the backyard and people standing outside with cookies and coffee.
I saw that room above my grandparents’ garage. Only now I was old enough to buy my own bowls and have a budget for butter. Naturally I call it The Bakehouse Texas.Â
I’ve been on maternity leave from the Bakehouse this summer after having our son John in April. The ovens have been quieter and my arms considerably fuller. But the season has not stopped me from scheming.
I’d still like to turn an old horse trailer into a coffee cart. I’d love to bring baking classes back inside the big house. I want cookbook authors, bakers, chefs, and small business owners to come to Bellville and make something wonderful with me. I’m also beginning to look for a little part-time baking help.
There’s plenty to dream about. For now, though, there is a bakery in the workshop, cookie dough in the freezer, and neighbors coming through the gate.
How cool is that!?
The Bakehouse Texas is back September 5th
After our maternity-leave intermission, we’re reopening Saturday, September 5th, and keeping things wonderfully simple this fall: no preorders. Just walk up, see what came out of the oven, and point at what you want.
Saturday, September 5
9 a.m.–noon, or until we sell out
310 E Palm St., Bellville, Texas
Look for the big leaning Victorian and come down the side driveway into the backyard.
September’s menu:
The Bakehouse Texas Chocolate Chip Cookies — enormous, chocolate-loaded, crisp around the edges and gooey through the middle.
Big Buttermilk Biscuit Jammers — tall buttermilk biscuits with bubbling pockets of jam.
Pork, Cabbage & Ginger Sausage Rolls — flaky pastry wrapped around deeply savory pork, cabbage, and ginger.
Brown Butter Cornbread Cookies — nutty brown butter meets sweet, craggy cornbread in cookie form.
Olive Oil Polenta Cakes with Raspberry — tender little cornmeal cakes with bright raspberry.
Cheddar Scallion Scones — buttery, savory, cheesy, scallion-y. You understand.
Everything is baked fresh Saturday morning and sold first come, first served until it’s gone. Bring your own mug and I’ll pour you a complimentary cup of Bellville’s own Interstellar Coffee. We accept cash, Venmo, and Zelle.
We’ll be open the first Saturday of every month this fall:
September 5 · October 3 · November 7 · December 5
To keep up with the latest Bakehouse news and bakes, follow along @thebakehousetexas. See you in the backyard, friends!
xo Joy
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