Tucked away off Avenue A and Second Street is a small shop selling pastries and coffee.
Whether it is children coming in with pocket money to buy a sugar cookie or corporate clients in need of a caterer, Salt and Sugar Texas has something for everyone, founder Susanne Behrens said.
“We are all about Texas,” Behrens said.
Behrens said she has always been interested in the hospitality industry. She has a degree in hotel and restaurant management.
“It’s always been a love for me in the hospitality industry,” Behrens said. “[And] I got to the point in my life where I could actually pull the trigger and do something.”
The bakery started as a booth at Fulshear Farmers Market in November 2018 and opened a shop in October 2019. Behrens and Store Manager Ashlyn Winchester both grew up in Katy. During the summer, kids from Katy work at the restaurant.
“It’s like this whole generation of Katy kids,” Behrens said. “Someone hired me when I was at that age, and now we get to do it for them. It’s really quite a circle.”
Salt and Sugar Texas has a variety of cookies and baked goods as well as a lunch menu. During the summer, it has a strawberry and blue cheese salad, and in the fall the restaurant will bring back its soup menu, Winchester said.
“We really focus on classic recipes with very high-quality ingredients,” Behrens said. “We get our things from everywhere. Wherever we can get the best product.”
When it came to the most popular items, the shortbread cookies stand out, Winchester said.
“It’s what got us here,” Behrens said. “We started them in the farmers market.”Shortbread combinations include cranberry pistachio, cherry almond and parmesan rosemary.
During the pandemic, the bakery scaled back its hours and closed the dining room but did not close the restaurant, Behrens said. Employees worked curbside and made deliveries. Along with saving money, the community helped the shop survive the pandemic.
“The Katy community built a hedge around us and supported us to make sure we made it,” Behrens said. “We had not been here long enough to have all that goodwill, but this community stepped up and stood right by us.”
Along with a seasonal menu, Salt and Sugar Texas caters and builds custom event menus. The custom menus ensure the bakery is fitting the needs of the event while being budget conscious, Behrens said.
Salt and Sugar Texas works with frequent customers that call a day in advance, and other times there are customers who come in one to two months before the event, Behrens said.
“Business is always evolving,” Behrens said. “You have to see where the business is going to take you.”
