According to an article from the Chicago Eater, Del Sur Bakery will debut at 4639 N Damen Avenue in Lincoln Square.
“We are hoping to be open by the fall, but that’s not confirmed yet. I think space-wise customers can expect a very relaxing vibe to the bakery, a lot of colors and vibrancy. We’re going to ditch cafe seating and replace it with furniture to set it up like a living room,” Justin Lerias, owner of Del Sur, told What Now Chicago.
“Part of what I like about baking is having my friends come over and hang out while I bake for them, so that is what I’m trying to recreate within the bakery. The menu will be similar to what we’ve been offering at Side Practice Coffee. There will be a lot of laminated pastries with Filipino and Midwestern flavors, you can go to my Instagram to see what we’ve been doing!”
“We also plan on being very seasonal, so there will be a lot of changes. It’ll be a rotating menu through and through. We’ve also sourced local businesses for our coffee and tea providers, so that’s very exciting. We also will be making syrups in-house and highlight products.”
“Del Sur Bakery started as a pop-up. I have been making these pastries for two years since 2020, and the Tribune released an article about Side Practice Coffee and what they do. What they do is give a space for people with entrepreneurial interest, and at the time I didn’t think my pastries were good enough still, but my friends and family convinced me otherwise and the pop-up did well.”
“There was a line out the door and we sold out in 20 minutes, which is something I couldn’t comprehend! Then, we did another pop-up and that one got even busier. So in January 2023, Francis asked me if I wanted to sell my products regularly at Side Practice Coffee and I said yes!”
“I was the chef at Big Jones at the time, so I could only do three days a week. I was making pastries constantly and kept increasing my days at Side Practice to five days a week, so that summer that year it became evident that we had something really good going, and it was getting to a point where it was almost as busy as my main job.”
“I had to make the decision to leave Big Jones to focus on this, which was ultimately the right decision. I’ve never been happier or healthier in terms of my career. At first, we were calling it Justin Leria’s pastries, but I don’t know. I like to be behind the scenes, and it made me uncomfortable that people knew my name.”
“So, ultimately, we had to change it up. After a lot of thinking we ended up landing on Del Sur because that is the region (Zamboanga Del Sur) where my family is from.”
According to the article, Del Sur is scheduled to open next fall. “Del Sur is the brainchild of Justin Lerias, who previously had been selling — and more often than not selling out — his creative and beautiful Filipino American baked goods such as turon danishes, longanisa croissants, calamansi hojicha buns, and ube oatmeal cream pies at Ravenswood’s Side Practice Coffee (the coffee shop’s founder, Francis Almeda, is a co-owner of Del Sur.”
