COMING ATTRACTIONS
Austin bakery chain makes San Antonio debut near Alamo Heights
The scent of freshly baked bread will once again fill the former Twin Sisters Bakery & Cafe space. Austin-based mini-chain Swedish Hill is opening its first San Antonio location in the Sunset Ridge shopping center at 6322 N. New Braunfels Ave. near Alamo Heights.
The current version of the café first debuted in 2019, but its history stretches back to the ‘70s. Original owners Patricia Bauer-Slate and Tom Neuhaus first opened the bakery as Sweetish Hill in 1975, converting a Victorian-era house in East Austin. The business later moved closer to downtown in 1991 with Jim Murphy on board as a partner.
In 2018, it looked like the business was going to close for good, but prolific Austin restaurateurs MML Hospitality (then McGuire Moorman) took over the reins. Though the group revamped the decor and the name, it kept the basic formula the same — with some new additions from an opening team comprised of baker Jennifer Tucker, acclaimed Austin pastry chef Alex Manley, and Page Pressley, now the proprietor of The Newstand on Broadway.
Each of the locations stocks dozens of baked goods such as bagels, croissants, flaky kouign-amann, cookies, and tarts. Swedish Hill also serves lunchtime fare such as salads, sandwiches, rotisserie chicken, and deli salads. The menu is a little more contemporary than the original incarnation, selling ginger tahini kale bowls and chia seed pudding, but it keeps Bauer-Slate’s famed chicken tortilla soup.
Swedish Hill will be MML’s first foray in San Antonio, but it is arguably Austin’s most ubiquitous restaurant group, owning more than a dozen concepts, including Clark’s Oyster Bar, Jeffrey’s, and Perla’s. Swedish Hill itself has four locations in Austin and one in Aspen, Colorado.
MML has not formally announced the opening, but George Wommack, president and CEO of San Antonio real estate firm Headwall Investments, the owner of Sunset Ridge, confirmed the signing to the San Antonio Business Journal. Neither Headwall nor MML returned requests for more information by deadline. We will update this article with any further comment.
The Dallas location gives a sneak peek of what's in store for Alamo Heights.Photo courtesy of Vandelay Hospitality Group