Beer Garden Goodness

Downtown favorite Easy Tiger to open new location in up-and-coming development

Good news for North Austin beer lovers: Beer garden (and bakery!) Easy Tiger has announced plans to open a new location north of Hyde Park. The second location of Easy Tiger will be located in The Linc, the rebranded Lincoln Village development near Highland Mall. The Linc is also home to the new incarnation of VIVO Tex Mex.

The space will feature a drive-through coffee bar, a dog park, 250 outdoor seats, an outdoor stage and free parking.

With the North Austin location comes a much larger footprint and more offerings. According to a press release, the North Austin Easy Tiger will be nearly three times the size of its Sixth Street counterpart — it'll clock in at 11,500 square feet.

In addition to brews and bites, the space will feature a drive-through coffee bar, a dog park, 250 outdoor seats, an outdoor stage for occasional live music and free parking. Yes, there will be ping pong tables, too.

The new location will also include a full commercial bakery, allowing Easy Tiger to "immediately meet the great demand for its artisan baked goods and pastries, as well as expand its offerings."

"The wholesale bakery sales at Easy Tiger have greatly exceeded our expectations, and we are producing twice what we estimated would be our overall capacity at the Sixth Street location," says head baker David Norman. "We currently deliver fresh-baked bread to more than 50 commercial customers, but we haven’t been able to accommodate any additional account requests in almost eight months — and that includes three out of the five local Whole Foods locations."

Try to curb your cravings for now. Easy Tiger's new location is slated to open in late 2015.

Easy Tiger will open a second Austin location in late 2015.

Austin Photo Set: News_Adrienne_Easy Tiger_jan 2012_logo

Photo by Keith Davis Young

Easy Tiger will open a second Austin location in late 2015.

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Back to the Plow

Homey Austin jam and bake shop closing and returning to farmers market

Confituras/Instagram

Confituras Little Kitchen is closing its brick-and-mortar store, but feeling optimistic about the future.

A famers market find is returning to its natural environment after six years in a brick-and-mortar location. Confituras Little Kitchen, which specializes in locally sourced preserves, is closing its jam and biscuit shop after service on Sunday, December 22. However, it will continue selling goods at the Barton Creek Farmers Market and via retailers.

Confituras announced the change in a newsletter to its customers in December. The letter called the news "bittersweet."

"Although the brick and mortar will no longer be, the good news is that this will be a fresh new start for us – we are bursting with energy and creativity at the thought of being back out in the community where it all started for confituras," it said.

The kitchen is closing because the lease is up, and the team has decided to "give up the chase." The newsletter emphasized the ups-and-downs of business over the past several years — ones that were chaotic for just about any business, let alone a small, fairly niche food operation.

"So much has happened since we decided to open a brick + mortar – a wonderful kickstarter fundraiser, THE PANDEMIC, the AFTER-EFFECTS OF THE PANDEMIC, and an ever growing city," the letter says. "We tried so very hard but never really got our footing. We know we are not alone, many small business are in the same boat. We renewed our lease during the pandemic because we were hopeful we could make it work - the changing times had other ideas."

Finally, it shared how customers could keep enjoying Confituras creations:

The Barton Creek Farmers Market is open at 2901 S. Capital of Texas Hwy. every Saturday from 9 am to 1 pm.
A list on confituras.net compiles retailers including Royal Blue Grocery, Farmhouse Delivery, and Antonelli's Cheese Shop.
Jam share and Table22 subscription customers will have more instructions coming soon about picking up their goods in January at the same space, 2129 Goodrich Ave.
Customers may also reach out to inquire about continuing to order meals directly.

The kitchen also hosted frequent events and workshops, but the letter did not address this aspect of the business.

A shorter message shared on Instagram has inspired 63 comments so far, five days later. Customers eulogized the shop for its community feel and providing a sense of regularity during the height of the pandemic thanks to weekend pick-ups.