{"id":213139,"date":"2026-03-10T13:49:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-10T13:49:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/213139\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T13:49:42","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T13:49:42","slug":"this-famed-sourdough-bakery-will-open-its-first-cafe-this-summer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/213139\/","title":{"rendered":"This famed sourdough bakery will open its first cafe this summer\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rize Up Bakery\u2019s (opens in new tab)<\/a> sourdough has appeared on the menus of famed Bay Area restaurants and at farmers markets across the city. Soon, fans of these crusty, chewy, and occasionally colorful loaves will be able to get them straight from the oven.<\/p>\n

Founder Azikiwee \u201cZ\u201d Anderson\u2019s says he\u2019s converting Rize Up\u2019s SoMa production kitchen from a wholesale-only facility to one with a public-facing retail component. The full cafe will be up and running in time for his birthday, July 7.<\/p>\n

Anderson envisions a space with a full coffee program \u2014 the roaster is to be determined \u2014 alongside a food menu that highlights Rize Up\u2019s various sourdoughs, which include flavors like sesame-scallion, garlic-thyme, gochujang, masala, and bright-purple ube. That means fancy grilled cheese sandwiches, plus cookies, pastries, and Tartine-style open-faced toasts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In less than six years, Rize Up has developed into a sizable operation that serves clients such Palm City, Flour + Water, and both The Morris and Sirene, its companion restaurant in Oakland. Anderson\u2019s team also sells its loaves at 10 farmers markets around the Bay, from the Ferry Building to Clement Street and into the North Bay. (As of last weekend, Rize Up had a stand on Sunday mornings at Stonestown (opens in new tab)<\/a>.) Having started baking as a way to grapple with traumatic national events only to find himself cast in a Comcast commercial that aired during the 2024 Summer Olympics, Anderson never thought his baby would get so big, so fast<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really started everything ass-backwards,\u201d he says. Though he graduated from SF Cooking School in 2018, he\u2019d never worked in a commercial bakery. He started in his home kitchen partly in response to the 2020 killing of George Floyd, and quickly found himself with a devoted fan base \u2014 but the lack of a brick-and-mortar retail space has become a hindrance. \u201cWhen you sell everything at 30% and 40% off, wholesale, you don\u2019t make a bunch of profit,\u201d Anderson says. \u201cSo we\u2019re trying to right the balance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ABright purple ube sourdough is among Rize Up\u2019s more creative offerings. | Source: Justin Katigbak\/The Standard<\/p>\n

Citing San Francisco bakeries Butter & Crumble<\/a> and Breadbelly<\/a> as models, Anderson hopes Rize Up will see similar lines out the door. Drawn by the crusty, chewy sourdough and a vocal commitment to racial justice, some 75% of his customers are there for the same thing: the round $12 O.G. loaf (opens in new tab)<\/a>, made from an all-organic blend of wheat, whole wheat, spelt, rye, and malted barley flours. \u201cToast, a sandwich, making croutons \u2014 everything gets the classic San Francisco sourdough,\u201d Anderson says. \u201cAnd when you invite people over for dinner, it\u2019s gonna hit hard. Especially when they\u2019ve never tried our bread before.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s another advantage to opening a proper cafe rather than merely farmers markets: shelter from the elements. Inclement weather can mean a lot of unsold product, Anderson says. \u201cA farmers market is legalized gambling,\u201d he adds. \u201cYou bring a bunch of stuff \u2014 and if it rains, it\u2019s like snake eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rize Up Bakery\u2019s (opens in new tab) sourdough has appeared on the menus of famed Bay Area restaurants…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":213140,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[22660,8456,101,103,102,104,106,105,1911],"class_list":["post-213139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-bakeries","tag-restaurant-openings","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news","tag-soma"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/213140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}