Popular Savannah bakery to close on Valentine's Day. 'A place of love and heart for many'
Three hours remained until closing on a late January Saturday, and Back in the Day Bakery’s cases were bare, nary a bread crumb or sprinkle in sight. Folks kept coming in, looking for signed cookbooks, some Janie Q jams, something they could buy so that they would have a memento of the sweet spot.
“We’ll be open tomorrow and next weekend,” owner-baker Cheryl Day told the crestfallen patrons. She advised them to get there early, though. People had been lined up at the door by 9 a.m. and buying multiples of goodies, some to portion out and freeze to delay the inevitable – the day they would drive here and see a different name on the plate-glass windows.
Cheryl and her husband Griffith Day had revealed on Instagram just a couple of days before that their Art Deco building at the corner of Bull and 40th streets, the former Starland Dairy General Store, had sold and the last day of buying buttery, layered biscuits, by-the-slice cakes and pies, Old Fashioned cupcakes, sea salt-sprinkled chocolate chip cookies and fresh baguettes would be Feb. 14, 2024.
Although they had shared in November last year that they were selling, most people, including them, thought it would take a bit longer to find just the right buyer. “You know, I didn't want to just sell it to somebody. I really did care about it. I didn't want to sell it to somebody who was gonna, you know, white box it out,” Cheryl said.
Although the buyer has not been announced officially, Cheryl assured that it was somebody local who loved and had invested in the community already, and that baking would be part of the concept because the buyer had purchased the mixers and other equipment as part of the sale.
“I do feel really good about that,” said Cheryl. “You know, it’s someplace I would want to go, and that’s exciting to me. Honestly, they were the first people we thought of, and it was just timing, I guess.”
'We're still open': Back in the Day Bakery building listed for sale
'Like huge hugs from the heart'
It seems only fitting that Valentine’s Day, a day set aside to commemorate love in all its many iterations, is Back in the Day Bakery’s last day. Shannon Lancaster, a frequent guest over the years at one of the window tables, described it as her “happy place.”
“It was a place of love and heart for many people,” said Lancaster, who reminisced about long talks about writing and food with Cheryl. “The scent from the bakery goods felt like huge hugs from the heart.”
The cases will be overflowing on that final day a week from now, and Cheryl and Griff will be joined in the kitchen by some special people. Their mentor, who was there in the beginning 22 years ago when they opened their doors, is traveling from Portland, Oregon, to help. Nicole Rucker, the celebrated and James Beard-nominated pie chef of Fat + Flour in Los Angeles, is flying in for three days of emotional pastry support. Meg, their very first employee, is returning to take her place as a “Sugarnaut” and work the counter. So many former customers have written to tell her they are coming from wherever they have moved to so that they can get one last box of goodies.
Day admits to being in her feelings as Feb. 14 approaches. And, in a case of full disclosure, so am I. My first job when my husband and I moved to Savannah nearly 15 years ago, was at Back in the Day. I had the audacity to write that I wanted to be a “celebrated food writer” on the Career Objective line on the application. Cheryl later told me that’s why they hired me.
She, Griff and I wrote their first cookbook gathered around a corner banquette that’s no longer there. I can still see it, the way the early morning sun streamed through the windows as we wrote. The smell of Dancing Goat coffee, which I mainlined in those days, played like a backbeat to the scent of Chocolate Heaven frosting. I remember the kids, now grownups, who ordered their first newborn cupcakes and held them with chubby fingers. I remember my mom, still recovering from chemotherapy with a knitted cap covering her bald head, helping decorate for the cookbook launch.
Back in the Day Bakery opened its doors when there was no “Starland District,” or Starland Yard, Brochu’s Family Tradition and Bull Street Tacos. Even when there was still a defunct grocery store across the street, the Days helped entice the first trolley tours to venture outside of downtown and drew national attention when their bakery was nominated for a James Beard award.
She looks out the window and sees how much the community has changed and is proud to have been a part of its renaissance. “We knew exactly what we wanted to do,” said Cheryl. “That’s why I say, 'mission accomplished.'”
Not entirely, though. There are more cookbooks to write, said Cheryl, looking toward a future when she and Griff don’t have to rise in the darkness. There is more Milk Street Radio to record. More pie camps to host. More collaborations on the horizon. More sweet life to enjoy.
Amy Paige Condon is the editor and content coach at the Savannah Morning News. You can reach her at ACondon@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Back in the Day Bakery in Savannah to close in February
