Tag: High Point Grocery

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Nothing’s Half-Baked at Ranequa Bean’s 350 Baked

Ranequa Bean (Photo: Ravyn Towns)

Growing up, Ranequa Bean didn’t eat her vegetables. But she did eat her sweets.

So it’s no surprise she is now the owner of 350 Baked, which features her homemade cakes, cookies, brownies, and cobblers. Her goods are available online and in four locations, including High Point Grocery and Cordelia’s Market.

But getting back to those childhood eating habits. “I was definitely a picky eater,” says Bean. “Any type of vegetable you put in front of me, I wouldn’t eat. Only meat and cheese. I didn’t like ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise. I didn’t start eating a lot of things until I went to culinary school.”

Her mother was a good cook, but Bean’s “love for cooking” came from her aunt, Shapell Gates, who was a “Southern cooker.”

Bean’s first baking effort was a cake she made for her stepfather when she was in high school. “It was embarrassing. It was so bad … awful.

“The lines ‘Happy Birthday’ started at the top left of the cake and ended at the bottom right of the cake. I had some little flowers on it. He was so happy. He said, ‘This is the best cake ever.’”

The cake might have looked bad, but Bean says, “The taste was definitely there.”

A dog lover, Bean originally wanted to be a veterinarian. “I did animal science for two years. But it was in an animal physiology class where we had to artificially inseminate cows when I said, ‘No, mom. I can’t do this.’ I’d smell like cow poop all day.” She had a revelation: “I like dogs. I don’t like cows.”

It was “love at first sight” when Bean discovered the culinary arts program at The Art Institute of Tennessee-Nashville. She earned her associate’s degree in baking and pastry, but her bachelor’s degree in culinary management made the biggest impression. “They taught me how to open a business.”

She also learned to love vegetables after she tried grilled asparagus for the first time in culinary school. “It was something about the taste from the grill … the oil and salt. The grilled flavor brings the vegetables alive.”

Bean worked at several businesses, including the Radisson Hotel Nashville Airport, where she was sous-chef. Her first food-related job in Memphis was sous-chef at Baptist Memorial Hospital.

In her spare time, she sold pre-ordered slices of her caramel, strawberry lemonade, banana pudding, and other cakes at Sprouts Farmers Market and Whole Foods Market.

Bean chose the name 350 Baked because 350 degrees is the temperature of the ovens her desserts are baked in.

Last February, Bean quit her job as culinary director at Remington College – Memphis Campus. “350 Baked was getting a lot of recognition. I was getting more money from it than Remington.”

Also, she says, “I had reached my breaking point of working for anybody other than myself.”

More people were seeing photos of her cakes on Facebook and Instagram. “My goal in 350 Baked is to be a household brand.”

She also had another goal. “My goal was to be in three locations by the end of this year. I did it in three weeks. And I told my husband, ‘God is so real.’”

Bean now offers a regular list of cakes, cookies, and cobblers, as well as rotating specials. Her cakes and other baked goods are available on her website, 350baked.online, or via her Facebook and Instagram. She also sets up at the Downtown Memphis Farmers Market.

“Moistness” is what makes her cakes different from other people’s, Bean says. She credits culinary school for teaching her how to get the right texture and flavor profiles. She also has “secret ingredients,” which set her cakes apart. Her slogan is: “Without us, it’s just cake.”

Bean doesn’t want a brick-and-mortar location. “My business plan is to get a big ice cream truck, but with cakes.” She wants her truck to make “the sound like the ice cream truck makes,” but be more unique.

So, when people hear it, they’ll say, “There’s 350 Baked.”

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

On a Roll: Dave’s Bagels Available in More Locations

Dave Scott (Photo: Michael Donahue)

With a few bumps along the way, Dave’s Bagels just kept rolling along.

Dave Scott’s popular products now are available in numerous locations, including High Point Grocery.

He now makes between 2,000 and 3,000 bagels and pretzels a week. But at one point, he was down to making just 800 to 1,000.

Scott, who moved to Memphis from Portland, Oregon, in 2016, began selling his bagels at the Curb Market and eventually branched out.

Deciding he wanted an old-school bagel shop, Scott, with the help of City Silo Table + Pantry owner Scott Tashie, began looking for a brick-and-mortar location. “We kept hitting and missing,” Scott says.

Finally, in late 2019, he found the perfect spot. “We were going to sign the lease March 2020. So, thank God for people with good hearts and good intentions.”

The real estate guy called him and said, “Hey. This thing over in China seems like it’s picking up. Let’s give it a couple of weeks and see what happens.” Two weeks later — the lockdown. “Luckily, we had the brakes pulled on us.”

Going into “survival mode,” Scott says, “the week after lockdown, the business made $48. It was horrible. A month earlier, I had just been contracted with Tri-State Theatre Supply to supply all the Malcos with all the pretzels. Of course, that went down. So I had a little bit of a freak-out, but it only lasted a day or two. I didn’t skip a beat. I got in the kitchen the next week and kept producing.”

He was able to sell his bagels at the Cooper-Young Community Farmers Market. “Everything was relatively normal down there. Nobody knew what was going on, but customers were showing up. All reports were that being outdoors was a lot safer than being indoors.

“The whole community came out supporting us local businesses. They are the reason so many of us who had booths were able to stay afloat through this thing.”

And, he says, “I was lucky enough to qualify for a very small amount of PPP money.”

Business picked up, but the Covid surge in late November “hurt pretty good.” During that time though, Scott, through Tashie, met Sugar Avenue Bakery owner Ed Crenshaw. Crenshaw let him rent part of his building, so Scott would have a bigger commercial kitchen. Crenshaw also let him use his equipment, including “four of these amazing double-rack rotating ovens I’ve been dreaming about since I began making bagels.”

Eventually, Scott was making between 16 and 20 batches of bagels a week. Business picked up again. “People were feeling more comfortable to be out.”

None of his products changed flavor or formula, but Scott changed the shape of his pretzels to make them more cost-efficient. “I decided to make them into knots. They’re the same weight as the big pretzel twists I used to do, but they just look a little smaller.”

Scott picked up new locations, including High Point Grocery, Coffee Central in Southaven, and Coffee Central Squared in Hernando. He also started making “pretzel buns” for the black bean burgers at The Bar-B-Q Shop and “little bagel sandwiches” for Retro Coffee and Donuts. “One of the ones I’m most excited about is the new cafe, Ancient Grounds, at the Memphis Zoo.”

As for new products, Scott says, “I was thinking of offering some more specialty bagels in the future … and bringing back my fall seasonal varieties. I did a pumpkin spice for October with real pumpkin puree in the dough. And then in November, cinnamon apple bagels.”

Things are looking good for Dave’s Bagels, Scott says. “I feel like there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. I’m not in survival mode like I was.”

To find all locations for Dave’s bagels and pretzels, go to davesbagels.com/vendors.

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Arbo’s Cheese Dip Debuts at High Point Grocery

Photo: Michael Donahue

Cheese has been a key ingredient in Andrew Arbogast’s life.

Arbogast, 36, is the founder of Arbo’s Cheese Dip, which will debut at its first grocery store, High Point Grocery, on May 15th.

The dip, which he’s sold at pop-up events, is made from a recipe his dad, Charlie Arobogast, concocted years ago. “He may have run across some version of it in a magazine,” Andrew says. “And he just added some different things down the road and made it what it was.”

But Andrew, who grew up on his dad’s cheese dip, says, “All other cheese dips will never meet my expectations.” His dad’s dip was an essential at rotating “Sunday dinners” put on by about a dozen families. Everyone said, “Charlie, bring your cheese dip.”

Andrew also loved to cook. “I remember cooking macaroni and cheese in the sixth grade.” He didn’t go by the recipe. “I was just doing everything by touch, taste, feel, look.”

Andrew also loved to eat. “You can say the passion is not only cooking, it’s food. It’s all food. I love cheap or high-quality — five-star restaurants, but also Big Macs.”

Andrew Arbogast (Photo: Michael Donahue)

He went to boarding school at Subiaco Academy in Arkansas, but he looked forward to two things on his trips home: his dad’s sweet tea and cheese dip.

Andrew wanted to pursue cooking as a career after high school. “I wanted to go to culinary school ’cause that was my main passion. I learned that passion from my dad.” But his mother told him, “You need to get a real education first. And if you still want to do that, you can pursue that.”

Andrew began working toward a food service degree at Northwest Missouri State University, but he found he had to give that up after he got an ROTC scholarship to finish his education. So he switched his major to general psychology.

After he graduated, Andrew, who became an Apache helicopter pilot, spent 10 years in the Army, which included a stint in Iraq. Instead of asking his parents to send him socks or cookies, Andrew asked them to send him a George Foreman grill.

Andrew also was deployed to Afghanistan. “Before I left, I shipped myself five huge packages of summer sausage and cheese.”

While planning for their mission to Afghanistan, Andrew, who was the air mission commander, sat down with his soldiers and said, “We’re going to break bread together first.” “I came in with this foot-and-a-half summer sausage and smoked Gouda cheese and cut it on the table.”

His philosophy? “Food is morale.”

While in the service, Andrew married and he and his wife, Erin, became the parents of twins. But, he says, the service “was not where my future was meant to be.”

Andrew eventually got a job at International Paper, where he is category manager. Apparently, the culinary life still nagged at him. Last November, he woke up and his first thought was, “You need to figure out how to sell your dad’s cheese dip. You have the willpower, the drive, the passion.” He told his idea to an entrepreneur friend, who said, “If it’s good, it will sell.”

Andrew enlisted his friend and four other people to do a blind tasting between his dip and two other popular local dips. All five people chose his cheese.

Andrew chose the name “Arbo’s” because “it’s short, to the point, and it works.” Needing a catchy slogan to go with his logo, he came up with “Cheese Fix Mafia.”

Describing the dip, Andrew says it has “character and body.” It’s smooth, but chips won’t break when you stick them in the container.

Andrew is excited about Arbo’s Cheese Dip hitting High Point Grocery, but, he says, “My vision for this is to not stop at the local level. I want to be in Kroger. I want to be in Walmart. I want to be everywhere that sells cheese dip.”

Future plans may include a “spicier version,” but Andrew says, “right now, I’m not messing with a good thing.”

High Point Grocery is at 469 High Point Terrace; (901) 707-8102.

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News Blog News Feature

South Point Grocery Store Headed to South Main

From left: Vera Stanfield and Tom Archer of Archer Custom Builders and Taylor James and Rick James of Castle Retail Group.

Fresh foods will be the focal point of a new grocery store planned for Downtown Memphis. 

Castle Retail Group, parent company of Cash Saver and High Point Grocery stores, will bring a new store to South Main at 136 Webster sometime this year. The store, to be called South Point Grocery, is sandwiched between Central Station on the west and the U.S. Postal Service facility on the east. 

Tom Archer, owner and president of Archer Custom Builders, bought the building in 2017 with visions to bring a grocery store to Downtown Memphis. The store will be small — with a sales floor of about 8,000 square feet — compared to other stores. Its size and the neighborhood pushed the focus on fresh foods, said Rick James, owner and CEO of Castle Retail Group. 

“We know in a space of this size, we’re not going to have 48-roll toilet paper; it just won’t work,” James said. “But we can handle high-end, fresh produce, deli, bakery, and a butcher shop. Quality and freshness would be two of the key words.”

We can handle high-end, fresh produce, deli, bakery, and a butcher shop. Quality and freshness would be two of the key words.

Rick James, owner and CEO Castle Retail Group

Another grocery store has been on the Downtown to-do list for more than a decade, as some have said Miss Cordelia’s feels far away and disconnected from Downtown’s Central Business District. For years, Downtowners have have told surveyors that another grocery store is a missing gap for the neighborhood. James said many now drive five miles to Midtown stores, like Cash Saver or Kroger, to stores in West Memphis, Arkansas, or to big-box stores like Costco on Germantown Parkway. 

South Point Grocery will fulfill a years-long desire Downtowners have had for another grocery store.

James and Archer said South Point Grocery makes sense now with Downtown’s new population density. Nearly 26,000 people lived Downtown last year, according to the latest numbers from the Downtown Memphis Commission (DMC), up slightly from the nearly 25,000 people who lived there in 2010.  DMC data says nearly 88,000 occupy Downtown during the day.

“We’ve been down here all these years and South Main has been kind of on the edge of busting wide open,” said Archer, whose company is headquartered on South Main. “We wanted to get ahead of that but it beat us. It’s been crazy down here the last couple of years. So, this is perfect timing.”

South Point Grocery was, in part, inspired by Castle’s success at High Point Grocery. James said before buying the beloved community grocery store, his company had not really done a small-format store. Without it, “we wouldn’t have had the confidence that we can” run a smaller store Downtown. Archer said he’d been looking for a partner for his Downtown grocery building, saw James talking about High Point Grocery on the news, and walked away impressed when he went to see it for himself.  

The building features a parking deck on the east side with plenty of public parking available on Webster. A covered patio with ceiling fans front the street, which James said will be used for dining and, perhaps, live music. 

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Granola Goodness at Big River Bakehouse

CREDIT: Anna Turman

When it comes to selling her baked goods, Anna Turman isn’t easily discouraged. The founder of Big River Bakehouse began pitching desserts to High Point Grocery 10 years ago. “Back then, I didn’t know all the actual steps you had to take to put things in stores,” she laughs. Now, having been open for a little over a month, Big River Bakehouse has granola in plenty of local stores, as well as shipments sent out nationally.

Anna Turman

Spiced Maple Granola

Cooking has always been one of Turman’s favorite pastimes. “I’ve been doing it my entire life,” she says. “I love it because you can just be so creative, it’s relaxing, and you can let your mind kind of wander.” While she’s made plenty of desserts in her time, granola is something she just began pursuing recently. “I started out by making it for myself, and I kept looking up new ways to make it and new ingredients to use.” Eventually, she felt confident enough in her product to start her own business.

When it comes to baking granola, Turman goes about the process with health in mind. “Granola can use all kind of different components, so I use healthy fats in mine,” she says. “There’s no added sugars; it’s all raw natural ingredients. That’s been pretty important to my approach, since I wanted to try something unique.”

So far, Big River Bakehouse has three different varieties for sale. Simply Peanutty uses peanuts and roasted peanut butter as a base, and Blueberry Cashew is the most popular. Those two flavors use oats, but Turman also offers a low-carb, grain-free option. “My specialty granola, Spiced Maple, uses a lot of nuts and seeds,” she explains, “and it’s flavored with maple syrup. I do paleo and keto, so I wanted to make something I myself could eat at home. It’s great to eat out of the bag as a snack, but still goes well on yogurt. It’s a type of granola, but it’s basically made out of roasted nuts.” Only three flavors on the menu for now, but more ideas are in the works.

Turman works as a digital producer for FOX-13 during the week, but spends six hours in a commercial kitchen in Midtown every Friday afternoon and evening. “I put together all the dry ingredients first [nuts or oats], and then add wet ingredients, like coconut oil or raw honey,” she says. “I mix it all together in a bowl, and then it’s slow-roasted in the oven at low temperatures for about 30 minutes, stirring through the whole process. Afterwards, I let it cool for 15 minutes and add dried fruit at the end. When you pull it up from the container, it breaks apart into the little chunks.”

Anna Turman

Bag of Big River Bakehouse’s Simply Peanutty Granola

After finishing a fresh batch, Turman packages it all up for local distribution, and then ships out national orders on Saturday and Monday. While she felt a bit of trepidation at starting her own business, she knew she had to take the plunge this year. “I graduated from college at 35 last year, and felt really stable,” says Turman. “I thought if I don’t do it this year, there was always going to be some reason or excuse not to. I don’t feel really worried about the risk of failing, since this is something I was truly passionate about.”

Despite having little business experience, Turman wasn’t fazed in the early goings. “I’ve always been entrepreneurial-minded,” she says. The learning curve included obtaining all the proper certifications, as well as delving into strategies for her website and social media platforms. But with the business side of things now settled, Turman can turn most of her focus to the baking. “I’ve been thinking about branching out into other food items,” she says. “Something along the lines of baked goods. Maybe granola cookies, or a healthy muffin.”

Big River Bakehouse granola is currently available locally at High Point Grocery, Curb Market, and Miss Cordelia’s. “Memphis is a city that is really friendly and very helpful toward people who are wanting to make a food start-up or create their own food business,” says Turman. “I can’t stress that enough. In my experience, local stores have been very welcoming to people who have local products.”

Learn more or place an order at bigriverbakehouse.com


Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

High Point Grocery: The Same, But Better

CREDIT: Richard Murff

It was my friend P.C. Magness, the brain behind The Runaway Spoon, who said she hoped that someone would buy the old High Point Grocery and “keep it the same, only better.” True, that’s a tall, tricky order, but this is a lady who wrote a cookbook that actually makes you look forward to funeral food. So, anything is possible. As it happens, she got her wish.

For anyone who has actually lived in the neighborhood, the small, ’50s-era grocery store is almost always known as “the Little Store.” It was quaint, timeless, friendly, and convenient. It looked a little tired, sure, but it was such a fixture, the regulars ignored it. Even embraced it. Then COVID happened, and in April the Little Store closed with nearly everything else. With the lease coming up, and longtime owner C.D. Shirley eyeballing retirement, he made the decision not to reopen.

Richard Murff

Like losing naptime when you graduate to first grade, you just don’t know what you’ve got until you’ve lost it. Then Mrs. M announced that the fella from Cash Saver had stepped in to buy it and wasn’t changing the name. The fella’s name is Rick James, by the way, and whether he knew it or not, he did exactly what P.C. had hoped for: kept it the same, but better. I’ll admit some selfishness here because I was hoping that he’d recreate that great whacking hall of beer they’ve got in Midtown. Did that, too, up to a point.

Obviously, the Little Store is still pretty, well, little. You may not find some random Czech pilsner there, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a Memphis beer that isn’t on the shelf or in the cooler. And Memphis beer-can art is something to behold. To be sure, there are some solid non-local crafts to choose from, as well as Budweiser and other summer cooler-stuffing brands. It is still the Little Store, but Memphis beer is the star of the show. And there is a lot to choose from.

Since this foul year of our Lord went sideways, it’s been hard to keep up with the local craft scene because so much of it involved hanging around the taprooms, which have largely been closed. I’ve made a few attempts to turn my patio into a Murffhaus taproom, but it was just missing something — like other people (including that one guy who takes it a little too seriously) and that kid-in-a-candy-shop selection on tap.

I was pleasantly surprised at the simple variety being put out locally: standbys like Memphis Made’s Junt and Wiseacre’s Ananda, to newcomers like Beale Street Brewing’s 528hz of Love & Hoppiness. High Cotton has come out with its Oktoberfest, which, because this is Memphis, has a swine in lederhosen on the can. If memory serves, back in the spring October became our backup May before being re-canceled altogether.

To recreate a rescheduled and re-canceled May, you can always grab a can of something local and go get barbecue takeout for every single meal for a long weekend and get roughly the same effect as Barbecue Fest. To recreate Music Fest, go to Rachel’s and buy enough garden statuary so that your backyard seems crowded, drink enough so that you think taking your shirt off is a good idea, and then listen to music you thought you liked but really don’t. It’s not a perfect fit, but it’ll do.

For everything else that has gone away this year — crowded festivals and bars, schools, common sense, and an even remotely professional concern for personal appearance — the Little Store survived, the same just better. The local beer scene has managed to float along as well. That’s not by luck or government policy (or lack of). That’s just people sticking together through a really bad year.

And if that’s not worthy of a toast, I don’t know what is.

Categories
Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

High Point Grocery Bought by Cash Saver Owner Rick James

CREDIT: Taylor James

Taylor James

Rick James, CEO and owner of the local Castle Retail Group, chats outside High Point Grocery.

High Point Grocery has been purchased by Rick James, CEO and owner of the local Castle Retail Group, the company behind Cash Saver grocery stores.

The High Point Terrace store closed in April because of the coronavirus virus pandemic. Longtime operator C.D. Shirley decided to sell the store.

“We are excited to continue serving the High Point Terrace neighborhood and
community in the coming weeks after minor renovations are made,” James said in a statement.

James plans to have the store cleaned, stocked, and reopened by mid-August. A company official said Monday morning no major changes will be made. James said he hopes the former High Point Grocery employees will return to work at the store.

James has a connection to the High Point Grocery form early in his career. Shirley’s father, Charles, bought the store in 1971, and James became the wholesale
representative for the store and other many others in the 1980s.
[pullquote-1] “This store is similar to the store in which I started my career,” James said. “High Point Grocery is a treasure of the neighborhood, and we’re thrilled that C.D. is willing to allow us to continue its legacy,” James said.

James’ Castle Retail Group operates three Cash Saver grocery stores in the Memphis area. James has been in the grocery business for nearly 50 years, and he serves as the chairman of the Tennessee Grocers & Convenience Store Association and vice chairman for the Mid-South Food Bank.