Welcome back to Savannah Flavors, our weekly newsletter bringing you the latest delicious details from Savannah’s culinary scene every Thursday.

Here is what’s on the menu today:

• Not your ordinary cup of joe ☕️

• Brochu’s Family Tradition and their favorite savannah eats

• Make Gallery Espresso’s coffee walnut brownies at home

• Bar Julian’s pepperoni butter? 🧈

THE MAIN DISH

The rich story of Pour Boy Coffee and Mobile Barista 🚌🧋

The Renaissance man behind Pour Boy Coffee and Mobile Barista has done it all, and so much of what is his past is part and parcel of this uniquely original brewing brand.

Coffee is clearly the theme, but who Keith Smith is as a person and an artist are the backbone of his business whose trailer operations launched on January 1, 2023, and whose shop on Waters Avenue opened on February 22.

“I definitely felt the lack of places,” said Smith, who has lived virtually across the street for the last five years, and his Pour Boy shop now fills a niche for the nearby neighborhoods of Oakdale and Bacon, Highland, and Kensington Parks as well as the nearby businesses up and down Waters.

“It’s been as good as I could have hoped for,” he said of the early days of the café’s existence.

Savannah’s coffee culture is strong, a rich dark roast of locally owned cafés. 

In Skidaway, Cutter’s Point is king. In Habersham Village, Coffee-Deli is always crowded. Thomas Square denizens have Foxy Loxy and Perc, and just a few blocks further north are Henny Penny and The Sentient Bean. In Starland, Café Colibri recently took over the former Troupial house, and you can even grab a fresh-brewed cup inside Picker Joe’s.

Once you are north of Forsyth Park, the options abound, and honestly, Starbucks is only an option if you are walking down Broughton or cursing your way through commuter traffic along Abercorn, DeRenne, or Victory.

When you are coming back from the mall or from your kid’s soccer match at Jennifer Ross or to reward yourself after your doctor’s appointment or surviving a visit to the Georgia Department of Driver Services, you can stop into Pour Boy’s brick-and-mortar home base for a non-chain coffee bevvy.

Truly, this is the only coffee for miles in any direction, and this cup is served with a sweet backstory.

CHEF’S CRAVINGS

Brochu’s Family Tradition - Michael Dulay and Jared Ross 🍻 🥪

Each week, I ask the folks behind the phenomenal food at our favorite places around Savannah these same simple questions:

When you are not in your restaurant kitchen, where do you go out to eat and what do you order?

This week’s Chefs’ Cravings come from the sous chef duo at Brochu’s Family Tradition, Michael Dulay and Jared Ross, both of whom have been in the Starland standout’s culinary team since it opened in December of 2022.

MD: If I’m getting lunch on Monday, I usually go to Anita’s Deli [Sandwich], right catty-corner from Crystal Beer Parlor. They have this Italian sub that is really good. Just about every time I go, that’s what I get. I go there at least once a month.

JR: Sandwich-wise, I usually go to Waters Cafe, once, twice a week. It’s great 🥪

MD: That’s really close to where you live, too, right?

JR: Yes, so that is my breakfast spot on a daily basis. I usually get a bagel with lox. It’s more about the space: super-colorful, really friendly, good people. It’s probably the cheapest sandwiches you’re going to find for good quality, all under ten dollars.

MD: I also go to Urban Deli, which just opened up right by me. They’re super-nice, and they have this display case of giant, awesome salads. My wife and I will go there and get the sandwich-salad combo for fifteen bucks: a full salad and a full sandwich. It’s a deal. I usually just go there for a cup of coffee, but if I’m in the mood for lunch, I’ll get something there.

JR: Where I go for my late-night dinner once or twice a week is Over Yonder, and I get myself a chicken sandwich and some fries with bacon aioli. It’s damn good for a meal that you can get at eleven or later with a beer.

MD: I eat that Doublestack often.

And for a special occasion?

MD: My wife and I will go to Common Thread, not extremely often but often enough. We’ve really enjoyed it. If I just happened, for some reason, to have taken off a Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday, because they’re closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, we’ll go to The Steakhouse on Whitemarsh.

JR: I want to go try that.

MD: I love their steaks 🥩 If I had to take off a Friday, my wife and I would go there, no matter what. I like strip steaks and ribeyes, but they have all kinds of cuts. They have great martinis and great wines. Their pour is nice, and it’s not that expensive. It’s reasonable.

JR: I lived a quarter mile from there when I first moved here, and I passed by it for a year and a half.

MD: It’s unassuming. 

JR: I agree with Common Thread. I think what Opie and Brandon and the rest of their team do is fantastic. I can’t say I go there very often, but if I wanted something that I can depend on, quality, well-executed food, that would be it. Beyond that, I would go to E-TANG 🥟, and I can get some soup dumplings and some tasty apps.

MD: I just had some soup dumplings there the other night.

JR: They’re fantastic.

-Neil Gabbey

TRIED, TASTED, TRUE

Coffee Walnut Brownies 🍫

THE STORY BEHIND THE RECIPE

I am repeatedly and forthrightly on the record about the brownies at Gallery Espresso. Time and again, this impossibly tall, dense and dark delight is our go-to dessert-to-go, and I am sad for you if you have never devoured one.

Loyal readers are well aware that chocolate is not my favorite flavor for a sweet, but this brownie is craveable even for those whose preferences are flakier pastries and baked fruits. We are often downtown and within a short stroll from Chippewa Square, and I cannot count how often we have sauntered out of Gallery merrily carrying a little brown bag stuffed with two big brownies, one with walnuts for me and one without for my wife. 

The whole point of this TTT column is to chronicle my attempts to recreate great dishes at home, and for the last four years, I have tried to replicate these brownies in the event that we want to save ourselves the trip down Bull Street, not to mention ten bucks. That written, a five spot for one of these choco-blocks is an incredible deal.

Though I readily admit that my rendition has yet to match the original in terms of its height, my recipe has yielded brownies whose texture and taste are about as great, if I do bake so myself.

The conundrum from the start was how to concoct a thick brownie that was still decidedly brownie and not cake. Simply for its tall walls, I first used a 9” x 5” loaf pan, which worked marginally well, but for the last two years, at least, Nordic Ware’s 9” x 9” cake pan has gotten the call. With a depth of nearly two-and-a-half inches, it amply holds plenty of batter and makes for a thicker pour than a standard 9” x 13”.

In a recent Triple T column, I referenced cafedelites.com, that time for a creamy pasta dish, and of all the brownies on the worldwidewebternet, Karina Carrel’s “World’s Best Fudgiest Brownies” live up to their name and make for a fine guideline.

Other than pouring the batter into the by-volume-smaller pan, my main modifications are a slight reduction of the white sugar, from 260 grams to 250, and equally slight increases in flour, from 130 grams to 140, and salt because no one wants to measure three-quarters of a teaspoon of anything. Just make it a full teaspoon, for salt’s sake.

In an effort to increase these brownies’ vertical, I have dabbled with varying dashes of baking powder, enough to give them a lift without making them too cakey but never more than a full teaspoon.

As I do with most choco-centric baked goods, I dissolve instant coffee grounds into the vanilla extract in a one-to-one ratio. Trader Joe’s 100% Colombian Instant Coffee is ideal for this flavor boost.

The melted butter and sugars will not emulsify entirely, but if you take your time and electric-mix-in each egg separately, the wet bit of the batter will cream nicely before you add the dry ingredients. For that step, put the mixer away and gently fold in the flours et. al. with a rubber spatula so that you do not whip up too much air.

Speaking of TJ’s, I usually go through one of the Pound Plus dark bars a year, and while chopping chocolate is never fun, this stuff is dang-great for baking. Despite the extra work, you will never go back to bagged chips or chunks. 

If you have never made a parchment-paper sling for a baked good, do it for these brownies, using two perpendicular sheets. You will thank me later.

Because my wife does not want the walnuts, I do not mix any into the batter itself and, instead, dollop them on the surface of half before baking. More often than not, the nuts do not split the difference evenly so that she can have bigger brownies each time I bake them.

For the final Gallery Espresso flair ☕️ I sprinkle the top with a little brown sugar halfway through baking, which should never be until a toothpick comes out clean.

Next time, I am going to use my Pullman loaf pan and pour the batter twice as deep to see if I can achieve the inspiration’s thickness. Wish me luck.

-Neil Gabbey

THE RECIPE

HARD GOODS 

• 260 g. white sugar

• 200 g. light brown sugar, plus more for top (optional)

• 1 t. kosher salt 

• ½ to 1 t. baking powder (optional)

• 140 g. all-purpose flour

• 100 g. unsweetened cocoa powder

• 200 g. roughly chopped chocolate , semisweet or dark

• 1 T. instant coffee granules ☕️

• ¼ c. chopped walnuts (optional) 🥜

WET GOODS

• 1 cup (two sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled 🧈

• 2 T. (30ml) canola oil

• 4 large eggs 🥚 

• 1 T. vanilla extract

DO THIS

1. Preheat an oven to 350°

   • Alternately, preheat a convection setting to 340°

2. Prepare a 9” x 9” cake pan with Baker’s Joy and a parchment-paper sling

3. Into a small bowl, measure out the flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking powder (if using)

4. In a small bowl, combine the vanilla and instant coffee granules until dissolved

5. Into a large mixing bowl, measure out the sugars 🥣

6. Pour the melted butter and oil into the sugar bowl and electric-mix until well-combined, roughly five minutes

7. Add the eggs to the butter-sugar bowl, one at a time, electric-mixing until it is light and creamy, like pancake batter

8. Whisk in the coffee-infused vanilla

9. In at least four installments, gently fold the dry goods into the wet goods, scraping the sides and bottom of the bowl to make sure all of the dry is incorporated

10. Fold in the chocolate

11. Scrape the batter into the prepared cake pan and press to each corner with a spatula

    • Knock the pan against a counter to settle the batter

12. Bake for 40 minutes and test with a toothpick for doneness

13. When the tester comes out almost clean, remove the pan from the oven

14. Let the brownies rest for 10 minutes and remove them from the pan using the parchment-paper sling

15. After another hour, the brownies can be cut and eaten

BEEN THERE. ATE THAT.

Bar Julian 🍹🧆

You had us at ‘pepperoni butter’.

Since Savannah’s swankiest rooftop resto opened, our Bar Julian must-have has been a serving of this sumptuous side. To anyone who has never been to the tippy-top of Thompson Savannah, my wife and I spread our praises on thick, particularly of this self-named purée.

Our standard line since that first dollop has been, “Where has pepperoni butter been all our lives?”

A few weeks back, a little ramekin-ful was in front of us, surrounded by a sampler of starters we shared as the sun began to set over the city. Though the flatbreads are all fine-and-tasty, I had just made pizza at home, so we opted for an order of falafel ($9), the locally made Isreally hummus + crudité ($10), the house bread ($5), and that amazing blended butter ($3).

At first, I suggested that we share one of the house breads, but I wisely listened to my wife: we ordered two. Had Plan A won out, I would have apologized the rest of the night.

moral of this meal: When at Bar Julian, order one house bread for every diner. Do not be fooled or dissuaded by its humble moniker. This may well be the best bread in the entire city, a loaf that is plainly delicious plain but stars as pepperoni butter delivery system.

Baked to order, the house bread is actually “our pizza dough,” Thompson Savannah executive chef Victoria Shore shared, “but by docking it and not stretching it out, the high heat in the oven creates a lot of steam in the dough quickly which puffs it up in that iconic balloon shape.” 

If you do not smile when the bread is served, you have no soul. The bubbly, brown five-inch-tall dome rips to reveal a steamy hollow center atop a wide and open crumb, and the interior’s ceiling looks like the inside of a choux pastry. This is edible proof that food equals happiness.

Shore cited a restaurant in Atlanta that may have survived the pandemic by selling quarts of pepperoni butter. 

“I figured if it worked for them, it would work here, especially with our delicious bread,” she explained, “so I played around with a few different salamis and pepperonis when we were opening until I found one that was soft enough to really whip into the butter but still has that classic pepperoni flavor.” 

As is the case with most delicious things, my only ‘complaint’ about the falafel is that the serving of three is not enough. A popcorn bucket of these unique fritters would not be enough. Wait until you fork one open to expose its vibrantly emerald center.

Fried to a deep umber, this classic Lebanese falafel is crisp out the outside and magically moist on the inside, thanks to grinding the chickpeas in a meat grinder and processing them with “a ton of fresh herbs, onion, and spices,” per Shore. It gives easily to a fork, and underneath, the blanket of Syrian red pepper dip packs a piquancy that kicks on the backside, complementing the fritters’ mellow middles.

It seems that everyone and his uncle is whipping up some sort of hummus nowadays, but Bar Julian’s lives up to its punny name. Great hummus is not difficult to make, though it is easy to mess up.

The beauty of this hummus is that none of its ingredients overwhelms the others, and its slightly loose consistency still has enough body to hold up on a veg slice. Bias discs of the orangest carrot and English cucumber scoop up the silky smooth dip kissed with a few toasted Anson Mills benne seeds.  

Adding my wife’s glass of rioja ($12) to the tally, we were stuffed and incredibly satisfied for under fifty bucks.

As ever, the sunset and scenery on the roof were on the house.

-Neil Gabbey