Savory & sweet: Cloudview Kitchen serves up fresh coffee and baked treats despite pandemic limitations

SOAP LAKE — As Sandy Cheek stands in line at the Cloudview Kitchen waiting for coffee, she has no doubts about why she is here.

“We come here every week. We’re total regulars,” she said. “Great pastries, good looking guys making drinks. Coffee and food. What else could there be? This is the best coffee in Grant County.”

Her husband Guy nods in agreement.

“I think it’s the best coffee in the basin,” he adds.

As they wait, Blayne Walsh is slowly making — crafting may be a better word — a fancy espresso drink, pouring shots of dark Italian coffee and foaming milk from a dairy farm in Othello. Along with the varied buns, breads, scones and pastries on display, it’s what draws people to this place. Even with COVID-19 restrictions that don’t allow for indoor dining right now.

“We were selling out on Sundays, a packed house, with everyone minding their p’s and q’s,” Walsh said of the several months before the most recent COVID-19 restriction. “It’s what the community was itching for, and it made your heart so full and warm to see these connections happen, to see people back in this place just making the ball roll in the community again.”

Even with the new restriction, Walsh said it’s all about people connecting “over sweet treats and coffee and warm conversation,” though they can’t do it inside.

Cloudview Kitchen, on Main Avenue East, is owned by the same farmer who owns Cloudview Farm in Ephrata, Jim Baird, and his firend Theresa Sergneri, who brought Walsh, Coulee City native Dusty Bolyard and his mother Ursula in to run the kitchen — to bake and make coffee and organize the place — in addition to the work both Walsh and the younger Bolyard do on the farm planting, tending and harvesting.

The kitchen is currently open three days a week — from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday.

“What we do now bakery-wise related to the farm is a lot of our produce we’ll take from the farm and use in the kitchen,” Walsh said. “Whatever’s in season, we’ll use that as much as possible. Right now, we’re using all of our leeks that are left over, all of our Yukon gold potatoes, carrots, all the yummy root stuff.”

And with that “yummy root stuff” they make hand pies, flakey galettes (flat round pastries that can be either savory or sweet), and scones with kale that are more cheese than flour. It’s all brought Cloudview Kitchen a very loyal following, and kept them busy.

“Even with the most recent restrictions, the community is still continuing to support him just as strong,” Walsh said. “Whatever we can do to keep you guys going, because it’s such an amazing meeting place and common ground, especially in this area where there’s not a lot.”

Both Walsh and the younger Bolyard said they fled Seattle not long after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, with Bolyard coming back to be with family in Coulee City. A chance encounter with co-owner Sergneri opened up the possibility of working on the farm and the kitchen, Bolyard said, and the two have not looked back.

In addition, Bolyard has opened a hair salon and Walsh has established space where he designs, makes and sells clothes and other textiles he creates, part of finding ways to keep the kitchen open during a tough time.

They have even created a “living room” for relaxing and hanging out. When that’s allowed again.

“These guys are very talented across the board,” said Julie Johnston, education director for Cloudview Farms in Ephrata. “At first I thought they were amazing farmers, and then they started cooking, and then I saw all this, and I was like, wow!”

Sergneri, who also has some space for the art she creates at the Cloudview Kitchen, says she’s impressed with both Walsh and Bolyard and the work they are doing to keep both the farm and the kitchen going.

“We’ve had different people in over the years, and it’s so nice to have Blayne and Dusty and their mom here,” she said. “You do a project with them and they get stuff done. They use high quality ingredients, and they have really good food handling practices.”

“It’s neat to have more things happen here,” Sergneri added.

Walsh said he hopes, at some point, that Cloudview Kitchen can be open more days of the week, possibly Wednesday through Sunday. Because it’s clear that here, in the Columbia Basin, he’s found something akin to his calling. Crafting coffee drinks, tending kale, and sewing and weaving shirts.

“It’s a really good vibe here, and we’re hoping to keep it alive,” he said. “We’re not going anywhere, so as long as everybody’s coming and wanting good things, we’ll be here to offer them.”

Correction: Signeri and Baird are not and were never married.