Baked, good

Loquat (Hayes Valley)

GOODS & SERVICES • FOUND Bakery

Before friends and business partners Tal Mor and Jodi Geren opened Loquat, its charming Hayes Valley corner was occupied by 20th Century Cafe, a destination for European honey cake and pierogi — plump, delicious dumplings reminiscent of the foods that made my Russian childhood a little less gray. After 20th Century closed, the neighborhood welcomed Loquat, which tapped into my second (and much more significant) home, Israel.

I moved to Israel as a child. Mor left Israel around that same age, and for him, Loquat has been somewhat of a personal project. It shows: the adorable cafe, featuring satisfying hues of deep red and beige, is a rare Bay Area representative of bourekas (flaky, savory triangles stuffed with anything from squash to mushrooms), kubaneh (a barely-sweet, addictive yeasted bread from Yemen), and babka (the salted chocolate is a winner, but the cardamom ricotta has an especially nostalgic charm). Everything is made by talented baker Kristina Costa, including the puffy flatbreads the cafe deploys during its occasional nighttime pop-ups.

All the goods are served on floral ceramic plates alongside simple, memory-evoking treats like fresh mint tea, little halva cubes, and in the case of the savory pastries, pickles, brown hard-boiled eggs, and feta, a holy trinity that instantly teleports me back to Tel Aviv.

Mentally, I’m at Loquat every other day, occupying one of the velvet banquettes, nibbling on some labneh cheesecake or a Turkish coffee cream tart. In reality, I visit it every other month, order the bourekas plate or a slice of walnut and poppy seed babka (Mor’s favorite, he once told me), and reminisce about 20th Century Cafe’s borsch. If that’s not self-care, I don’t know what is. –Flora Tsapovsky

→ Loquat (Hayes Valley) • 198 Gough St • Wed-Mon 8a-5p.